Praise for works by

VICTORIA DAHL

“Dahl delivers a fun, feisty and relentlessly sexy adventure in her first contemporary.”

—Publishers Weekly on Talk Me Down

“Sassy and smokingly sexy, Talk Me Down is one delicious joyride of a book.”

—Connie Brockway, New York Times bestselling author

“Sparkling, special and oh so sexy—

Victoria Dahl is a special treat!”

—Carly Phillips, New York Times bestselling author, on Talk Me Down

“[A] hands-down winner, a sensual story filled with memorable characters.”

—Booklist on Start Me Up

“Dahl has spun a scorching tale about what can happen in the blink of an eye and what we can do to change our lives.”

—RT Book Reviews, 4 stars, on Start Me Up

Dear Reader,

Welcome back to the mountains of Colorado!

For this story, we have to take a little drive over the pass to Tumble Creek’s sister city of Aspen, Colorado. I hope you don’t mind, but Jane Morgan lives and works here and dedicates her whole life to running the Jennings Architecture office with an iron fist. Jane is the very picture of perfection…but appearances can be deceiving.

I got the idea for this book while I was people-watching. This probably won’t surprise you, but I tend to make up little stories in my head about people I see when I’m out and about. Some folks seem to fit neatly into slots, but the people who don’t…these are the stories I have fun with. The punk-rock teenager at the grocery store who helps his elderly grandfather slowly down each aisle every Sunday. The conservatively dressed librarian with the tattoo that peeks above the edge of her crisp collar. Or the perfectly composed office manager who’s hiding a scandalous past behind her cool facade…

Of course you can’t judge a book by its cover, and none of us are exactly who we seem to be on the outside. But some people use their appearances to hide important truths, and my fascination with people’s secret lives is what compelled me to write Jane’s story. I hope you find her as interesting as I do!

Happy reading!

Victoria Dahl

Lead Me On
Victoria Dahl

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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This book is for Grandma Winnie.

I love you and miss you.

There are so many supportive people in my life that I couldn’t possibly thank them all. My family sacrificed a lot of time and hot meals for this book, so I can honestly say it wouldn’t have happened without their love. Thank you, gentlemen.

And thank you to my agent, Amy, and my editor, Tara, for making the entire Tumble Creek series possible. I hope you enjoyed your time in the mountains.

I’ve always said that the romance writing community is the warmest group in the world, and it’s true. Jennifer Echols is there for me every day, encouraging me when I need it, and rapping my knuckles when I need that, too. Courtney Milan did her best to help steer me in the right direction with the legal details of this book, and hopefully my alignment wasn’t off. And people like Kelly Krysten offer encouragement with sheer kindness. Thank you!

My biggest thank-you goes to my readers. Thank you so much for wholeheartedly embracing the Tumble Creek series. Your notes and kind words mean the world to me.

CONTENTS

Cover

Praise for works by VICTORIA DAHL

Dear Reader

Title Page

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

JANE MORGAN STARED at the man seated across the table from her. The lunch crowd at the trendiest restaurant in Aspen was a pretty quiet group. There was nothing to distract her from Greg Nunn.

She watched him chew his food, his jaw moving as anyone else’s jaw would move when they ate. He wasn’t sloppy. He didn’t dribble crumbs down his chin or flash an occasional view of partially chewed pasta. He ate the way any reasonable man would. So why in the world did she feel vaguely nauseated as Greg swallowed and wiped his mouth?

“Is your steak all right?” he asked. “It looks a little rare.”

“No, it’s fine,” Jane insisted, and made herself cut off another piece and raise it to her lips.

“I told you to get the prawns.”

Jane chewed and told herself not to growl. In fact, he’d mentioned that grilled prawns were low fat, as if Jane needed to lose weight. That was a new development. Maybe he was feeling the strain between them, too.

Greg turned his attention back to his own food, and she stared in horror as he slipped another bite of salmon into his mouth and began to grind away. Surely his teeth worked a bit more vigorously than necessary? Lowering her gaze, she swallowed hard to get her piece of steak down.

They’d been dating for four months now, though they’d been sleeping together only a few weeks. Aspen wasn’t exactly a huge dating pool, so Jane tried to step cautiously into those waters. Now she wished she’d held off a little longer.

Before they’d slept together, Greg had been the perfect boyfriend. Smart, attentive and mildly funny…he’d even struck the perfect balance between patience and desperation during the long wait to get into her bed. But now that he was in her bed, he was becoming more proprietary every day. Sleeping over every other night. Insisting she attend every dinner and cocktail party hosted by his attention-loving boss. And now he thought he had some input into her lunch selection. Jane felt the walls were closing in around her.

Ridiculous, of course. She wanted a future with a smart, ambitious, successful man, and Greg was on the fast route toward becoming the lead assistant district attorney. But even his promising career couldn’t make her forget the fact that he made love like a rabbit.

Jane frowned at the small sound Greg made when he took a sip of water. How could a man of such keen intelligence even begin to imagine that women liked it fast and frantic and shallow?

She’d tried to let it go. She really had. A man couldn’t be judged on the depth of his thrusts alone. He was handsome, educated and only a bit vain. He loved his job and he was good at it. He’d be a good father if they ever got that serious. Greg Nunn was exactly the kind of boyfriend Jane needed. Any other woman would be holding on to him with two clenched fists. A couple of months ago Jane had been holding tight herself.

But every time she’d seen him this week, all she’d been able to think about was the absentminded way he clicked his fingernails together when he was thinking. Or his habit of humming when he drove. Not humming actual songs, just hmmmm-ing in a tuneless sigh. And now the way he chewed.

The idea that he might put that mouth on her tonight when they went to his place for dinner… The idea that they might have sex…

Jane shuddered and set down her fork. “Greg, I’m afraid this isn’t working out,” she said without any preamble.

He picked through the grilled vegetables on his plate, pushing aside the peppers. “Hmm?”

“I’m breaking up with you.”

A pepper slid off the plate and onto the table. “What?”

“I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t be so abrupt. I just don’t think this is going anywhere.”

“But…” His eyebrows snapped together. “We’re going to Fort Collins this weekend so you can meet my parents!”

She smoothed a nervous hand down her practical gray skirt. “Yes, I know. This is really awful of me. You’re a wonderful man—”

“Oh, great.”

“—but I just don’t think there’s much chemistry between us.”

“Seriously?” He looked genuinely shocked.

Jane pushed her glasses up nervously. “Well, there are sparks, of course,” she fudged. “But you aren’t in love with me.”

“Jane, we agreed from the start that we would take this slowly. I’m concentrating on my career and you didn’t want to rush into a physical relationship.” Greg leaned forward, his eyes taking on the bright expression of a lawyer sinking his teeth into an argument. “Waiting was fine with me, but I thought we both expected that we’d take it slowly emotionally, too.”

“Of course, but—”

“There’s plenty of sexual chemistry between us, and we’re perfectly suited in temperament. We’ve got the same goals in life, the same aspirations. And I respect you. I think you’re being a little hasty here.”

She was being hasty. But regardless of her practical nature—or maybe because of it—she could see she had no future with a man if she couldn’t bear to have sex with him just three weeks into their physical relationship. Still, there was no way she could say that to Greg, especially since the sex seemed to be just fine on his end.

“I’m sorry. It’s not you, it’s…” Oh, God, was she really about to say this? Yes, she was. “Me,” she finished feebly.

Greg looked as disgusted with her as she felt with herself. “I can’t believe this.” His fork clattered against his plate. “Unbelievable. What am I supposed to tell my parents? ‘I’m a wonderful guy, but Jane decided to break it off right before the weekend she was going to meet my family’?”

“Maybe you could tell them I got sick.”

“I’m not going to try to hide the fact that you’ve dumped me, Jane. It’s not that much of a goddamn blow.”

His voice was getting louder. She’d wounded his pride. Greg hated losing cases, and apparently he hated losing the girl, as well. She recognized the hot fury in his eyes, because he looked the same after a bad day in court. Actually, he’d gotten that look the time she’d canceled a date to help her boss with a project. Maybe she should’ve paid less attention to his bedroom skills and more attention to his character.

Jane glanced nervously around. Only a few sets of eyes were on them. “I’m sorry. I was just trying to help. Maybe I’d better go.”

“Maybe you’d better,” he snapped. “And don’t call me up when you get lonely in a couple of weeks. That new legal assistant’s been eyeing me for weeks. You can bet I’ll be talking to her tomorrow.”

He’d meant to hurt her, obviously, but all Jane felt was relief. And a fleeting hope that the new legal assistant preferred friction over thrust. “I’m sorry,” she said one more time as she grabbed her purse and stood. “I thought it would be better to end things before I met your parents. Do you want me to pay my half of the bill?”

“For Christ’s sake, just get the hell out!” Greg snatched up his water and took a gulp, not meeting her eyes at all.

Had he been in love with her? She didn’t think so. He looked more furious than hurt. But it didn’t matter. She couldn’t stay with a man she wasn’t attracted to. “Goodbye.”

She waited for an answer, but none came, so Jane turned and walked toward the door. Her feet wanted to run, but she wouldn’t let them. She thought she heard a muttered curse behind her—something like “frigid bitch”—but she didn’t acknowledge it. She’d been called a lot worse than that in her life. And if that was what he’d said, then good riddance.

Jane stepped out onto the street and took a deep breath. Free. Invisible ropes of tension were falling away as if she’d cut herself free with a knife. This was becoming a pattern with her. Cringing at the thought, she started her walk back to work. It was only half a mile, and she felt totally energized.

A few more hours in the office and then the whole evening stretched out before her like a promise. No sex with Greg. No discussion of opera or foreign films or constitutional law or any of those other things that helped to shape her public persona. After work, Jane was going to go home, take a bath and watch something vile on pay-per-view. Maybe a horror movie. All that and she could still get to bed early and be bright eyed for work tomorrow.

Wow. She was free.

She tried to tamp down the relief that swelled inside her. She’d be twenty-nine on Sunday. The last year of her twenties. In 368 days she’d be thirty. She wanted to marry someday, wanted the chance to have children if she decided to. And if she wanted to marry the right kind of guy, she had to stop dumping boyfriends for superficial reasons.

A woman didn’t need hot sex to live a good life. Just as she didn’t need a man with muscles. A rough guy in jeans and boots. A man who would wind his calloused hand into her hair and tell her exactly what he was going to—

“Crud.” Jane shook her head to scramble those thoughts. She wasn’t that girl anymore, and she never would be again. That girl had been a nightmare of low self-esteem and even lower expectations.

Jane Morgan was a respectable woman and she’d marry a respectable man. She had a few more years to find one, surely, but wouldn’t it take that long just to meet someone and truly know him? She was going to have to get over her boredom with safe men, fast.

Despite her stern internal lecture, Jane couldn’t stop her grin as she headed toward her office, but once she walked through the door she put on her serious face and got back to work. A half hour later her world was back to normal. The perfect quiet job in the perfect quiet office…until her cell phone rang and she glanced down to see the screen flashing “Mom.”

“Oh, no,” Jane groaned, taking a deep breath before she dared to answer it.

“Honey,” her mom said immediately, “please tell me you’ve heard from your brother.”

Alarm spiked in her blood. “Jessie? Why, is something going on?”

“He didn’t come home last night.”

Jane’s heart stopped, though not out of panic. No, her heart stopped out of sheer disbelief. “That’s why you’re calling?”

“He left at six last night, and he didn’t come home and he hasn’t called, and I don’t know what to do!”

“Mom…” She made herself take a deep breath and count to ten. “You’re being ridiculous.”

“I just… Oh, honey, I’m sure your little brother is in trouble.”

“Oh, that’s probably true,” Jane answered. “I just have no idea what that has to do with me. Jessie’s twenty-one years old, Mom. An adult, just like me.”

“Well…” Her mother sighed. “He never had the advantages you did, baby.”

Jane squeezed the phone tighter and glared at a spot of late-afternoon sunlight hitting Mr. Jennings’s door. Advantages. The woman was living in a dream world.

“He’s not as smart as you.”

A deep breath helped bring Jane’s blood pressure down. “I’ve told you not to call me at work unless it’s an emergency. This isn’t personal time for me.”

“It is an emergency!”

“No, it is not. A grown man can’t be considered missing after eighteen hours. Especially not a grown man who likes to drink and hook up with skanky barflies.”

“Now, that’s just mean!”

“Mom, I’m sorry, I have to go. Is there anything else?”

“Well, I don’t think so… Wait! Are you coming over for your birthday?”

Jane cringed. Before breaking up with Greg, she’d had the perfect excuse to miss a birthday party with her family. But now… Jane found herself wishing her mom had forgotten her only daughter’s birthday, but no such luck. Her mother had been a pretty shabby parent, but not because she lacked kindness or generosity. Just the opposite, in fact. But Jane hadn’t needed a girlfriend when she was growing up. She’d needed a mother.

“Sorry, Mom. I’m busy.”

“Oh, are you doing something with that new boyfriend?”

“Mmm-hmm. Yeah.”

“You could bring him with, you know.”

Jane tried to picture Greg in her mother’s house, but the idea defied the laws of nature. He’d never have made it past the burned-out car in the front yard.

“Your dad finally hauled off the Corvair,” her mom added hopefully.

Well, then. No burned-out car in the yard, so that just left…everything else. Her family, the shop, the house and the other cast-off vehicles scattered around. Perfect. Maybe her mom had added that chicken coop she’d always wanted.

“No, thanks, Mom. I’ll call you, though.”

“Oh. Okay. All right.”

Ignoring the obvious disappointment in her voice, Jane hung up and stared at the phone as the screen faded to black. What did it say about her that she’d rather be alone on her birthday than spend time with her family? What kind of person was she?

The familiar guilt sank its claws into her heart and squeezed.

As an adult, Jane could see the mistakes her mother had made through a clearer lens. There had been no malice in her mom’s decisions, just immaturity and desperation. The life she’d subjected Jane to—the poverty and prison visits and constant moves—had been the only life her mother had ever known. And without the early intervention of her stepfather, Jane would’ve sunk straight into that life, too.

So she wasn’t truly angry with her mom anymore. She was just…uncomfortable.

Her family—her mom and stepfather and brother—knew who Jane really was. They knew the kind of girl she’d been, and they saw right through her false transformation into a conservative businesswoman.

The problem wasn’t so much her family. The problem was that Jane Morgan was a fraud. And she didn’t like being reminded of it.

Better to keep the two halves of her life separated by a wide expanse. That way, no one got hurt, especially Jane.

WILLIAM CHASE CRANKED UP the stereo as he roared down the mountain. The wide-open windows let in the crisp spring air and quite a bit of dust from the road. Chase didn’t care. After a blast like that, nothing could ruin his mood.

Fifteen hundred pounds of dynamite chewing up granite as if it were papier-mâché. Sweet mother. Without a doubt, Chase had the best job in the world.

He tapped his hands against the steering wheel and grinned. Blasting days were his favorites. They didn’t come often enough, though. It took a lot of planning to execute, plus an unbelievable amount of paperwork. And hell, most excavations didn’t require even one single stick of dynamite, just a backhoe and a bulldozer. But when a new hotel was going up on Aspen Mountain, the foundation had to go somewhere, and that somewhere was straight into the bedrock.

Though he’d started Extreme Excavations only six years before, Chase had already made a name for himself as the go-to guy for tough jobs. Not just the big stuff, but the intricate work, as well. Chase could blow out a wall of rock fifty feet wide and leave the hundred-year-old barn that stood two feet away without even the slightest creak of boards.

He was good, and he knew it, and that made the work even better.

Smiling, he turned onto Main Street and passed his favorite coffee shop without a glance. No need for caffeine today. He was high on life. And explosions.

When he pulled into the parking lot of Jennings Architecture, he didn’t get out right away. Instead, he let his head fall back against the headrest and waited for his favorite song to end. When the bass-heavy music faded away, the drip of water from hundreds of roofs became the dominant sound. Winter was officially over, and months of grueling work stretched out before him.

Scoring a job with Quinn Jennings was a big coup. Quinn was one of the most sought after architects in town, and though Chase normally worked on commercial projects, he’d jumped wholeheartedly at the chance to work with Quinn on a few residential builds.

Chase cut the engine and headed into the small office building. As soon as he crossed the threshold, he was stopped in his tracks by a large desk guarded by a woman whose posture radiated cool judgment.

A pair of big brown eyes studied him through black-framed glasses. “Good afternoon,” the woman said. Her eyes flickered to his chest and then back up. Chase felt a jolt of interest, but the disapproval in her gaze made him wonder why he felt like smiling.

“Hi, I’m Chase,” he said, giving in to the smile.

She didn’t respond, except to raise an eyebrow. Even her fingers stayed poised over the keyboard, as if she were only waiting for him to move along so she could get back to work.

“I’m with Extreme Excavations,” he clarified.

“I see. A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Chase.”

“It’s just Chase.” Another arch of her eyebrow. Chase cleared his throat and tried to shake off the urge to squirm. “Quinn Jennings asked me to stop by to pick up some preliminary plans. I told him I’d be here today.”

The woman finally lifted her hands from the keyboard and folded them primly on the desk. “Mr. Jennings is on the phone right now. If you’d care to have a seat, he should only be a few moments.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m Jane. In the future it may be best to speak with me about project materials. Mr. Jennings has a tendency to overlook those kinds of details when he’s working.”

“Um…okay. Nice to meet you, Jane.”

“Can I get you something? Coffee or water?”

“No, thank you. I’ll just…”

Her head tilted toward the grouping of chairs to his right, as if Chase were a child in need of coaxing. Chase nodded and sat down without another word, relieved that this woman wasn’t his secretary. He’d live in terror of ever being late to work.

Then again, she was kind of pretty.

Chase’s brow fell into a frown, as startled by the thought as he had been by the little zing of interest he’d felt under her gaze. He glanced up to watch her type something on the computer. Her stylish little glasses slipped down her nose and she nudged them up again.

Was she pretty?

Well, despite the fact that she seemed to be made of ice, her full lips looked very soft. And her brown eyes were gorgeous in spite of her reserved expression. The rest of Jane was difficult to decipher. Her black suit jacket was tailored to reveal nothing of her figure, and her shiny brown hair was pulled back into a tight knot. The only jewelry she wore was a pair of small pearl earrings.

In every way she looked like a conservative professional woman who didn’t believe in letting loose.

Fingers typing away, she glanced toward Chase, and he averted his eyes to the nameplate on her desk. Jane Morgan.

Something about that rigid exterior made his fingers itch.

He dared another peek and happened to catch Jane licking her lips. The tip of her tongue looked very pink against her mouth. If she wore lipstick, it was the very plainest of colors, but there was nothing plain about that little flash of her tongue.

Chase shifted in his seat and drew her eye back to him. This time she glanced away. A flush crept into her cheeks, and his pulse sped in response. He probably wouldn’t even have noticed such a faint hint of color in another woman’s cheeks, but it seemed like a significant response for her. She was aware of him, and he narrowed his eyes and let his gaze slide down to her elegant neck.

Her skin looked soft as all hell, and he couldn’t help but wonder how a lady like this would respond to being nibbled. But why the hell was he thinking about nibbling a complete stranger?

Before his frown could fully form, he realized what it was. The blast. He was always pumped up after a good explosion. Pumped up and horny as hell. Prissy Jane probably wouldn’t react well to that at all.

His cell rang, cutting off the chuckle rising in his throat.

She looked surprised when he murmured, “Pardon me,” and stepped out the door. Surprised because he was polite? Because of the tattoo, maybe? Chase was smiling when he answered the phone, though his insurance agent’s talk of rising liability rates sobered him up pretty quickly.

Chase paced back and forth across the doorway for a few minutes, arguing his case, but it was no use. The agent swore it was an across-the-board increase and nothing to do with Extreme Excavation’s records. “Our goddamn safety record is spotless,” he insisted one last time, glancing through the glass to be sure the secretary hadn’t overheard him and covered her ears.

Her eyes were on him. She was watching, but she wasn’t scowling. Jane the secretary was staring at his chest.

Chase froze and watched her as his agent babbled in his ear. When her gaze finally rose to his, she blinked rapidly before snapping her eyes back to the computer screen.

Well.

He turned his back on her and wrapped things up with his agent, then glanced quickly over his shoulder to try to catch her again. No such luck. The woman was fully focused on her work.

When he tucked the phone back into his pocket, Chase realized that there was a smear of gray dust across the front of his dark blue T-shirt. Maybe that’s what she’d been looking at. “Shit,” he muttered, strangely disappointed that she hadn’t been indulging in a fantasy of getting dirty with a blue-collar worker.

Shrugging, he headed back inside just as Quinn Jennings emerged from his office.

“Hey, Chase,” the architect said, hand outstretched.

Chase shook his hand and took the folder Quinn offered. “Thanks, man.”

“Sorry I forgot to leave it with Jane. Next time you’d better call her.”

“That’s just what she said.” Chase dared a look at her, but Jane ignored the conversation.

“Well, apparently I’m trainable after all,” Quinn said with a laugh. “Keep it as long as you need.”

“Shouldn’t be more than a few days.”

A hand popped into his view and snatched the file from his fingers. “I’ll take that,” Jane said. “I’ll need to make a copy before it leaves this office.”

“Um…understood,” Chase answered the back of her head. She was already at the copier.

While Quinn excused himself to head out to a site, Chase checked out Jane’s ass, but her straight gray skirt didn’t offer much of a view. She was tall, and either curvy or a little chubby, but Chase was a man, and a little softness on a woman didn’t scare him at all.

“Here you are, Mr. Chase.”

He blinked and took the file. “It’s just Chase,” he repeated, though he was beginning to suspect she was quite clear on the matter and simply didn’t approve.

“Have a good day,” she said in answer.

Unwilling to be so obviously dismissed, Chase opened the file and flipped through a few of the papers. “Your boss is good at what he does.”

“He is.”

He looked over a couple more drawings of the mountain home, then cut his eyes toward Jane. She didn’t notice. She was too busy staring at him again. This time it was his arm that had caught her attention, either his biceps or the ink stretched across it. Somehow he suspected it was the black bands of his tattoo.

His heart thumped in excitement. Maybe Miss Prim and Professional wanted to take a little walk on the wild side. Luckily, Chase was in just the mood to accommodate her curiosity.

“Jane?” he said softly, startling her enough that she jumped.

A blush warmed her cheeks as she turned back to the computer. “Is there something more I can help you with?” Despite her pink face, her voice was perfectly cool.

“Yes, actually.” He closed the file and approached her desk. “How about dinner tonight?”

Although she froze, Jane didn’t look up. “What about dinner tonight?”

Ah, of course. This woman would require something a bit more formal. Fine. He’d play along. “Jane Morgan, would you do me the honor of accompanying me to dinner tonight?” Hell, he even gave her a little bow to top it off.

Jane was unmoved. Literally. Her fingers hovered above the keyboard again. “What?”

“Would you like to go to dinner?”

Her hands finally dropped, banging against the keyboard. “No, I would not.”

Chase wasn’t exactly surprised, but he felt oddly heavy with disappointment, all the same. “Are you sure?”

She licked her lips again and tossed a brief look his way. “Thank you, but I’m sure.”

Damn, her lips were downright sultry now, flushed pink and glistening with moisture. Chase cocked his head. Yeah, her lips were sexy as hell. “Well, if you’re sure,” he said, stalling.

“I am.” Jane took a deep breath, put her shoulders back and began to type.

“Right,” he muttered. “Have a good day, then.” And there was nothing Chase could do but leave.

THE OFFICE DOOR eased closed with a little hiss. Jane kept typing gibberish. She waited, counting to twenty, before she slid her hands off the keyboard and dared a glance at the glass door. The man’s truck was turning out of the lot. She was alone.

Letting out a deep breath, Jane slumped in her chair. “Oh, crud.”

What had just happened?

Despite the scene over lunch with Greg and her mother’s phone call, Jane’s day had been proceeding at its normal professional pace. A rush of calls after lunch from contractors driving back to work sites. The quiet buzz of a well-run workplace for a few more hours. That disastrous lunch hour had hardly put a hitch in her stride.

And then he’d walked in.

The sight of him filling the doorway had shocked the life out of her. He wasn’t big in a body-builder kind of way, but he was tall. Probably six foot three or four, with a wide, solid frame that took up more space in a room than it should. His brown hair was short, nearly a buzz cut, but so thick it looked soft to the touch.

Jane shivered at the thought.

Three solid hours of freedom and she was already thinking about an inappropriate man. She shouldn’t have broken it off with Greg. Greg was educated, ambitious and mannered. He wasn’t big and tattooed. He didn’t drive a dented, dusty truck. He didn’t work for an hourly wage at a dead-end job and wear steel-toed boots and dirty T-shirts that clung to his muscles while he labored.

Her skin tingled and Jane muttered, “Oh, crud” again. This Chase guy was exactly the type of man she didn’t need in her life. The kind of man who made her skin tingle, not to mention other less visible parts of her. No, he was not the kind of man she needed, but he was the kind she wanted. Raw and primal and big.

“I will not be my mother,” she insisted to the computer screen. “I will not be my mother.” The computer stared her down. “Screw you,” she snapped, then glanced around guiltily. She did not use undignified language.

And she did not date men whose biceps were ringed with thick bands of stark black ink like some sort of brutal, ancient warrior.

Jane rolled her shoulders and stretched her neck. “I won’t be my mother,” she murmured one last time. “And I won’t be that girl again.” Then she erased the mess she’d made of her Excel spreadsheet and forcibly turned her mind back to work.

CHAPTER TWO

JANE’S MUSCLES WERE liquid with exhaustion as she stepped out of her car the next morning. She’d been too anxious and distracted to follow through with her plan the night before. Instead of heading home for a movie, she’d called up her trainer and spent an hour working the heavy bag at his private gym. Then she’d eaten a whole pizza, watched TV until midnight and overslept.

Jane unlocked the office door and rushed inside to drop into her chair. Fifteen minutes late. She was spiraling.

One night on her own and Jane Morgan was sinking low, her facade crumbling like mountains of melting snow in the parking lot.

It didn’t matter that she took care to dress professionally and maintained a manner more prickly than a librarian. It didn’t matter that she refused to show even a hint of friendliness to the dirty contractors and groping developers and sexist engineers, or that she made very, very sure to date only appropriate men…. She hadn’t changed at all.

Jane was still attracted to the same kind of guy she’d dated in high school: tattooed, rough and ready to ride.

“Crap,” she groaned. She’d had a very sexual dream about Chase the night before. And just that dream had gotten her off in a way that Greg hadn’t even approached.

Though, she reasoned to herself, he didn’t seem exactly like the kind of guy she’d once run around with. And he wasn’t exactly the type of man her mother had favored for years.

Despite the fact that his jeans had been creased with age and dingy with ancient dirt stains, he’d smelled of laundry detergent. His hair was cut short and neat, belying the dark curves of a tattoo that curled straight up the back of his neck and disappeared into his hairline. And most important, he couldn’t possibly be an ex-con. Extreme Excavations specialized in blasting. Even if Chase was low on the totem pole, permits for high explosives weren’t handed out to companies that employed criminals.

So, no, he wasn’t exactly like the guys from her past.

Jane snapped from her thoughtful daze and scowled at her reflection in the black computer screen. “Nice standards there, Jane Morgan. Clean underwear and no felony record.” Her reflection glared at her, stern and disapproving. Her neck was straight. Her shoulders rigid. Her nostrils flared with outrage. Until she suddenly slumped in defeat. “I’m a fraud.”

Fraud she might be, but she was damn good at maintaining the illusion. When a car door slammed in the parking lot, Jane snapped straight, banged on the keyboard to bring her computer out of sleep mode and jumped right into the report she’d been working on the day before.

The door opened and she expected to look up and see Mr. Jennings walking in. What she didn’t expect was the man who’d visited her dreams the night before.

But she was cool Jane now, the impenetrable fraud, so she merely raised an eyebrow. “Good morning, Mr. Chase.”

“Hello, Miss Jane,” he countered.

She almost laughed at his joke, and what a disaster that would have been. If he knew she found him charming, he might ask her out again. She didn’t allow her expression to budge. “What can I help you with?”

He held out the folder he’d tucked under his arm. “See? Safe and sound. I’m the soul of responsibility.”

“Mmm-hmm,” she murmured, trying to hide the way he was wreaking havoc on her concentration. His sleeve had inched up, revealing more of the tribal tattoo on his left arm. “Thank you.”

“So…” he said.

She jerked her eyes up from his arm.

“Have you thought any more about it?”

“About what?”

“Going out to dinner with me?”

“No,” she answered as if it were the honest truth. Actually, it was. Dinner hadn’t entered into her thoughts even once.

“Come on.” He smiled at her, his wide mouth curving into a very handsome grin. His dark blue eyes sparkled. “Just dinner.”

“No, thank you.”

“Why not?”

“You’re not my type.” The bald-faced lie fell smoothly from her tongue.

“You sure?” He glanced toward his arm, and Jane felt her pulse leap.

Oh, my God. Had he looked at his tattoo when he said that? She felt her face heat despite her best efforts to suppress the betraying flow of blood. He’d seen her looking.

But those could have been looks of horror, she told herself. They’d meant nothing. Nothing.

Her pulse wouldn’t listen to her. It gathered speed. Chase smiled and put one hand on her desk to lean closer. His gaze fell to her mouth, and she could feel herself breathing too fast.

Last night as she’d boxed, she’d imagined her trainer was Chase. She’d imagined him grabbing her, his hands sliding across her damp skin, his mouth descending with a growl….

Oh, God, her masquerade was crumbling around her. What if she let Chase—

Her cell phone rang, breaking the man-spell she’d fallen under. Jane looked down to the phone, and the display was a bucket of cold water dumped over her head. “Mom” it read, the backlight glowing red in warning.

She stared at it for a moment, skin cooling as each second ticked by. “Yes,” she finally answered him, “I’m sure.”

“Sure about what?”

“I’m sure you’re not my type, Mr. Chase, but thank you very much for the invitation.”

Though his face fell, Chase didn’t look the least bit angry. In fact he pulled a business card from his back pocket and handed it over. “All right, then. Call me if you change your mind. That’s my cell.”

“Thank you.” She meant to drop it in the trash. She really did. But as Chase turned and walked out, Jane tucked his card into her purse. Then she turned off her cell phone and stuck that in her purse, too.

She was working, and the world of rough men and burned-out cars and bad mothers could go to hell.

“I’M SO GLAD YOU DECIDED to meet me,” Lori Love said. “God only knows how long I’ll be sitting here.” She pushed one of her brown curls behind her ear and set her elbows on the bar.

Jane smiled. Lori and Mr. Jennings were very seriously involved, and Jane seemed to have gained a friend in the deal. Still, they weren’t really the type of friends to hit the town together, mainly because Jane didn’t hit the town. She glanced around the dark hotel bar. “I don’t know why you agreed to meet Mr. Jennings here.”

“Oh, I’m smarter than you think. Quinn’s at a business dinner at The Painted Horse. I refused to go, but I’d already agreed to that damn city council party at eight. So we’re meeting in the middle. I get to avoid the boring dinner but still participate in free drinks afterward.”

“Congratulations.” Jane raised her empty martini glass in salute.

“Why aren’t you coming to the party?”

“I wasn’t invited.” Jane looked up in surprise when the bartender put another drink in front of her. Apparently he’d noticed her waving the glass around. “Oh, thank you.”

“Please come with us,” Lori said. “It’s downstairs in the ballroom. You can keep me company while Quinn talks shop.”

Jane considered it for a moment. A party. Drinks. Eligible, appropriate men. Professional and educated. The party would be the perfect place to meet the kind of man she needed to meet, but the thought of doing that tonight, of being professional and conservative and reserved… Jane glanced down at her drink and found it empty.

“Sorry, but you’re on your own,” she said. “No work for me tonight.”

“Damn,” Lori muttered. “Hey, did you read that book-club book yet?”

Jane had talked Lori into joining the monthly women’s group at the local bookstore. “I did. It was really thoughtful and deliberate.”

“Ugh. I thought it was depressing,” Lori said. “I didn’t make it past chapter six, when she went back to her suicidal husband. I dropped it and picked up one of my dirty books instead. The book-club meeting is right before my trip anyway. I’ll be busy.”

Jane felt a sharp stab of envy. Lori was building a life for herself, too, but it had nothing to do with trying to make herself respectable. Lori was stretching her wings, reading erotic novels and going back to college and traveling to Europe by herself. But Lori had been the good girl her whole life. She’d been responsible and respectable. Jane didn’t have that kind of past to fall back on, so she pretended to like depressing books that educated women recommended.

Another small act of fraud that added to Jane’s growing feeling of unease.

Lori nudged her. “I’ve still got that box of naughty stories with your name on it.”

Jane considered the offer for a moment. She’d turned Lori down flat a few weeks ago, but maybe dirty books would be a good outlet for her now. She’d found herself ogling her trainer during that boxing session the night before, and Tom was 100 percent gay. But gay or not, his shoulders reminded her of Chase’s.

“Maybe?” Lori said with a cheeky smile, but then her eyes shifted and the smile turned to a bright grin. “Hey, Quinn.”

Quinn Jennings slid up to the bar next to his girlfriend. “Hey, Lori Love,” he answered, his deep voice sinking to a purr.

Jane nearly blushed to hear it. Here was living proof that a good, intelligent man could throw off sparks with the right woman. Jane didn’t have to settle for safe and boring. She could find safe and spicy, just as Lori had. Then again, Quinn Jennings had never made Jane perk up and take notice. He wasn’t her type. Just as Greg hadn’t been her type and neither had the dentist she’d dated before him or the veterinarian before that.

“Hi, Jane,” Quinn said. “Are you coming with us?”

Lori took his hand. “Nope, she’s going to stay here and get sloppy drunk.”

The couple laughed at the idea, probably unable to imagine Jane being anything less than dignified. Little did they know.

Quinn muttered something about contributing to the cause, then tossed a ten-dollar bill onto the bar. “Another one for her,” he called.

“Oh, no, Mr. Jennings. I don’t—”

But he was already pulling Lori toward the door. “I’ll see you Monday, Jane. Stay out of trouble.”

The drink arrived, and what could she do but drink it? Fifteen minutes later she was cradling Chase’s card in her hands. He had a business card, so maybe he wasn’t just a ditchdigger. Maybe he was a supervisor of some sort. “W. Chase,” it said. His first name must be something horrific. Something like Worthington or Wessex.

Just Chase he’d kept saying, as if he were embarrassed to be called Mister. And he was right, of course. It didn’t suit him.

Jane glanced up, accidentally meeting the eyes of some guy two stools down. When he smiled and rose from his seat, she bit back a groan. She wasn’t in the mood. Not for him, anyway.

“Hi, there,” he said. “My name’s Dan.”

“Hi, Dan.” Jane didn’t offer her name. He was cute enough, and he was wearing a suit and tie, but he wasn’t her type. None of these guys was. She was hopeless.

“Do you live here in Aspen?” the guy was asking.

“Mmm-hmm.”

“I’m here on business. It’s a beautiful place.”

“Yes, it’s lovely.” God, why was he even coming on to her? She was wearing her ivory suit and her glasses, not to mention her pulled-back hairstyle. She’d designed herself to look uptight and unapproachable. Maybe she just looked lonely and desperate. An easy lay.

Dan leaned his elbow against the bar. “Can I buy you a drink?”

“No, thank you. I’m meeting someone here.”

That finally drove him off. As he sauntered away, Jane watched his back, thinking that he looked rather…petite. About the same height as her, with the same slight build as Greg.

Jane was five-eight and curvy. Was a big man too much to ask for?

She looked at the card again. Chase. He was big. He turned her on. And for whatever reason, he’d asked her out. He clearly wasn’t the marrying type, but did that mean she couldn’t just use him for a good time?

Mr. Jennings had dated a lot of the wrong women before he’d found Lori. He hadn’t taken any of those relationships seriously. Why shouldn’t Jane do the same?

And it was almost her birthday. Still, it wouldn’t be smart to sleep with someone from her professional world. It wouldn’t be smart at all, but it would be a heck of a birthday present.

Didn’t she deserve one night of hard, primal sex with a real man? Just one tiny, delicious detour on her journey to a respectable future? No one knew about her past. No one could point and say, “That girl is just as trashy as she used to be.”

Jane took out her phone. “You’re tipsy,” she tried to warn herself, but that only made her feel better about what she was doing. “This is a bad idea,” she breathed. “Really bad. But I’m tipsy.”

Finger shaking, Jane turned on her phone. She reached to press the first number, but she didn’t do it. She set the phone down on the bar. She took a deep breath. And then it rang.

“Oh, jeez,” she muttered, slapping a hand to her chest. Saved by the bell. Except that the screen was flashing “Mom” again, and that couldn’t be good.

“Hello?” she answered.

“Oh, Jane, thank goodness! I’ve got awful news. Just awful!”

“Mom, what’s wrong?” Her heart leaped.

“It’s Jessie!” her mom wailed.

“Oh, no. What’s happened?”

“He never came home and I’ve tried calling you all day. But, oh, my God, I finally heard something. Your brother is in jail!”

“Oh.” Jane’s heart began to slow. “I see. For what?”

“I don’t know. All I’ve heard are rumors. He hasn’t called home. I don’t know what’s going on!”

“Calm down. He hasn’t called home because he knows Dad is going to kill him.” Glancing around, she lowered her voice. “He was probably picked up for possession. You know he gets high, Mom.”

“Will you have your boyfriend find out where he is? Somebody said it might be Pitkin County.”

“Are you—” Jane snapped her mouth closed. Are you crazy? she’d meant to say. “Mom, it’s Friday night. There’s nothing to be done now.”

“But he’ll be there all weekend if we don’t—”

“Mom,” Jane said sharply. “Calm down. If he hasn’t broken down and called you, then he’s probably okay. If he doesn’t get in touch before the morning, I’ll do what I can, all right?” But damned if she was calling Greg.

“But…” Her mother’s voice faded away.

Jane felt her heart twist with worry. “Mom, is Dad there?” Her stepfather, Mac, was solid as a rock. Her mom would be fine as long as he was home.

“Yes, he’s here.”

“All right. What did he say?”

There was a long pause. Her mom’s voice fell to a whisper. “He said we should let Jessie cool his heels until he got the…nerve to call home and ask for help.”

Clearly Mac had used harsher language than that, but Jane just nodded. “Okay. It’s going to be fine, Mom. He’s twenty-one years old, and if he’s starting to get into trouble, a few days in jail will be good for him.”

“It…it just doesn’t seem right.” Her voice went hoarse with tears.

“No, it’s not right,” Jane muttered before she said goodbye and hit End. It wasn’t right that no matter how hard she tried, Jane couldn’t get away from this life. The life of courthouses and bail bondsmen and visits to jail. It didn’t matter how good she was at her job or how hard she worked. All it took was one phone call and Jane Morgan was right back in the trailer park.

She picked up the business card and looked at it one last time.

Yeah, she was spiraling, all right. Might as well enjoy the damn ride.

CHAPTER THREE

AH, CHRIST. Chase slapped down the visor of his truck in a burst of panic. He’d forgotten to shave.

“Shit,” he muttered at his reflection, swiping a hand over his prickly jaw. He popped the visor back up with another curse. There was no time now. Jane Morgan had called and asked him to meet her. Even the quick shower had been a risk. He’d half expected to come out of the bathroom and find that she’d left a message calling it off. Now that he was only steps away from the bar he wasn’t turning back.

He wasn’t sure what was going on, but he damn sure wanted to find out. Chase slammed the door of his pickup and rushed across the street to the bar.

It took a few seconds to spot Jane. She sort of…blended in to the background. Despite it being Friday night, her hair was still pulled back into a tight bun. She still wore her pricey-looking white suit. As he watched, she took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. Jane was getting sleepy. He was about to miss his chance at a date.

Chase pushed through the mingling crowd and stopped next to her table. “Hey, Jane.”

“Oh!” she yelped, slipping on her glasses before she pushed awkwardly to her feet. “Hello.”

“I’m really glad you called.”

“I…just… I had your card.” Her hands gestured helplessly, so Chase waved her back to her chair.

He glanced down to her glass of water. “Can I get you a drink?”

“Um…sure.”

Chase caught a waitress’s eye, and the woman sauntered over with a grin that faded when he tilted his head toward Jane. She ordered a martini and looked surprised at his request for a Coke.

“Aren’t you going to have something?”

“No, I don’t drink.”

Her eyes flew wide behind the glasses. “Oh! I’m sorry. I’ll cancel mine, then, and—”

“Hey, it’s no big deal.”

She shook her head. “I don’t want to be disrespectful or—”

“It’s no problem. I’m not an alcoholic, so you don’t have to worry that you’ll push me off the wagon. My dad’s a big drinker, and I thought it’d be better if I never started down that road.”

Jane looked doubtfully down at her water.

“Seriously!” He laughed. “You know I work in construction, right? I guarantee my friends can throw back a hell of a lot more alcohol than you can. So drink up.”

Her drink arrived as if on cue. “Well…” She picked up her martini with a bemused smile. “All right. Cheers, then.” Still, she took only a tiny sip.

“So why did you call? Not that I’m objecting.” When a blush climbed her face at his words, Chase grinned. A blush was good. Very good. The modest Miss Jane did like him, despite her earlier words. There was something about her that made him want to…mess her up a little. He’d never been interested in a woman like her before, but for some reason her coolness fascinated him. And this new nervousness pushed heat through his skin. She’d probably never even been alone with a guy like Chase.

Jane took another sip of her drink and swallowed hard. Her pearl earrings glinted softly, as if warning him of her modesty. “It’s my birthday. On Sunday, I mean.”

“Oh, happy birthday.”

“Thanks. So I just thought, um… Well.”

Chase blinked at the sudden blush in her cheeks. “What? You thought I’d make a good birthday present?”

“No!” she cried. “Of course not! That would be… No, I just thought I’d…celebrate.”

But that hot red burn belied her words. He’d been half joking, but now…

Jesus Christ, was he supposed to be the present she gave herself for her birthday? Chase wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

No, wait. He was sure after all. It felt pretty damn fine with him.

Jane finished her drink in one gulp.

“So,” he ventured, suddenly unsure what to say. All he could think about was the fact that Jane really was looking for a good time, and that good time apparently involved him. Still, she couldn’t possibly mean to be so forward. Maybe she thought they’d hang out tonight and go on another date on Sunday.

Chase cleared his throat. “How’s work going?”

“Fine. How’s the business of blowing things up?”

He grinned. “Pretty damn fun. Not that I get to blow things up very often, but when I do, it’s a rush. You wanna see a blast sometime? Maybe next week?”

“Oh.” Her soft mouth made a lovely little O. He noticed how perfect her skin was and wondered what it would feel like if he dragged his fingers across her cheek. Though her eyes had brightened with interest, she shook her head. “I can’t.”

“Think about it. I’ll call you next week.”

He ignored the way she frowned. She might be shy, but she’d called him. She was interested.

“Chase, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but…”

“Shit, did I screw up already?”

“No, I just want to be clear about something.” Jane sat up a little straighter, though he wouldn’t have thought that was possible. She always looked stiff. This girl needed some serious relaxing, and he’d be happy to show her how to get down and dirty.

“I’m not, um…” She cleared her throat again. “I just got out of a relationship, so this isn’t… This is casual.”

“Casual.”

“Yes. Temporary.”

Chase wasn’t sure why he felt a little twinge of hurt. After all, he’d asked her out while still riding an adrenaline wave. He hadn’t thought about much more than the challenge of getting her out for a drink, and then a little more. “Okay. Duly noted. I asked you out because I thought we might have fun, that’s all. No pressure.”

She smiled, her eyes flashing happiness. “Good. Have you had dinner?”

“Yes. Have you? I’d be happy to—”

“I’m good,” she blurted.

So she didn’t want dinner or a relationship. Was he losing his mind or did that leave only one possibility? “Let me buy you another drink,” he offered, the only thing he could think of.

“No, but thank you.” Her eyes fell to the table. “One more thing. I wouldn’t normally go out with men with whom I have a working relationship. I mean, I wouldn’t normally do this at all, but…”

“I’m happy you’re making an exception.”

“I trust you’ll be discreet?”

“Oh, of course.” Chase tried to shake off the feeling he was being interviewed, but Coke sloshed over the rim of his glass when he picked it up.

“If you breathe a word of this to anyone, I’ll have to deal with come-ons and crude remarks. I can’t have that in my workplace.”

“No problem. You can trust me.”

“Good.” She nodded, her mouth serious. “Can we go to your place, then?”

His throat spasmed, choking off the soda he’d been swallowing. The Coke tried to escape another way, burning toward his nose. Chase coughed in a desperate attempt to retain some dignity, but he couldn’t stop his eyes from watering. “What?” he managed, swiping at the tears. Despite his theorizing, he hadn’t convinced himself that Jane had called him for sex. He was feeling more sure by the second.

Jane didn’t answer. She’d regained her composure, perhaps because he’d lost his, and now she sat in her normal prim pose, hands clasped and resting on the table in front of her.

“Why?”

She frowned at him over those little black glasses. “Why do you think?”

The noise in the bar seemed to grow louder, making it hard for Chase to think. Of course he knew why, but…

Chase didn’t normally jump into bed with any woman who showed interest, but there was some sort of spark between them. Something that made him want to throw caution to the wind. Since he’d met her yesterday, his interest had built minute by minute. Hour by hour. And now, even though they hadn’t even had a first date… Now he felt an urgency overtake him. She didn’t seem like a woman who propositioned men. This wasn’t likely to be an open-ended offer. Chase was working within a limited time frame.

And it was her birthday. Almost.

Hell, this was every man’s dream, wasn’t it? A woman asking permission to jump his bones? Jesus, his little fantasy about showing the uptight secretary a good time was unfolding in front of him like a puzzle unlocking. It seemed way too good to be true.

Too good to be true…but Jane was watching him, waiting, eyebrows raised.

“Let’s go,” Chase said, holding out a hand as he stood. If this sweet little secretary wanted a good time, Chase was damn sure going to do his best to give her one.

JANE STOOD and smoothed down her skirt as Chase threw a couple of bills onto the table. Her knees shook. She’d never done this—not as an adult, anyway. But here she was, taking a man home for meaningless sex. Well, not to her home, but still.

When Chase grabbed her hand, she realized it was the first time they’d touched. She also realized that his skin sent flashes of electricity sizzling along her nerves. His hand was hot and big and rough around the edges. He felt like a man. Her weak knees shivered.

He led her out of the crowded bar and across the street to his truck. When they reached the passenger door, Chase stopped and turned to face her with serious eyes.

“This isn’t something weird, is it?”

“What?” The tipsiness she’d been comforting herself with made it hard to figure out his strange question.

“I don’t look like your dead husband or anything, do I?”

“What are you talking about?”

He watched her, his fingers sliding more deeply between hers. “You said you’ve never done this before.”

“I haven’t.” Not recently anyway.

His eyes narrowed to glittering slits as his gaze dropped to her lips.

Before she could think what to say, Chase dipped his head and pressed his lips to hers. She wasn’t ready for it. Strange, considering she’d propositioned him just a few minutes before. But she wasn’t expecting the taste of him right at the moment, his lips brushing over hers.

His mouth was nothing like his hands. His mouth touched her softly, a gentle pressure, testing her, feeling her out. When her shock wore off, Jane finally responded. She parted her lips a little, pressing into him, and Chase took the hint.

A shock of warmth against her bottom lip revealed itself to be his tongue, touching briefly before drawing away.

“Mmm.” She sighed, angling her head in encouragement. He tasted her again, teasing her until she followed his tongue with her own.

Oh, my. His work-roughened hand slipped around the back of her neck as he pulled her closer. Chase’s kiss became deeper, deeper, until Jane found herself clutching his T-shirt and hanging on tight. His tongue thrust slowly. There was going to be no jackrabbit action in this man’s bed. This was a careful, controlled assault.

The shivering in her knees climbed higher, shaking through her thighs. As if sensing his work was done, Chase brushed his lips over hers one last time before pulling away.

“Well,” he murmured. “Ready to go?”

Jane nodded. “Definitely.”

The truck beeped, the locks popped open and Chase reached for the door handle. “After you, Miss Jane.”

She flushed a bit at the reminder of who she was to him, but that didn’t stop her from climbing up and snapping the seat belt into place. This was a bad idea, but Jane wasn’t really a good girl and she never had been. She’d been faking it for ten years without a slip. Ten long years.

Frankly, it was a miracle she’d lasted.

Now she was tipsy and he was hot, and she wanted to drop the good-girl act for a few minutes. Or hours.

Chase slipped into the driver’s seat and flashed her a wicked smile. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, Jane, but I definitely like it.”

Finally she could respond to that grin exactly the way she wanted to. Jane smiled and slanted him a look from the corner of her eye. “Just drive.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She felt the looks he kept aiming her way as he drove, as if he found her impossibly intriguing. Amazing how an offer of free sex could monopolize a guy’s attention.

Jane squeezed her thighs together, thrilling at the darts of pleasure that resulted. The dream she’d had the night before had gotten her body primed for pleasure. Now just that one kiss had her squirming.

Thank God she’d put on sexy underwear that morning. She didn’t always wear lacy bras and panties, but it was one of the small pleasures in her life. Sexy lingerie. A tiny concession to her true nature. A secret beneath her professional clothing. It was a secret she wanted to let Chase in on. Quickly.

She hid her body beneath perfectly tailored clothing, because otherwise she drew too many eyes. Her curves had drawn attention from the time she’d hit puberty at eleven. The wrong kind of attention for a young girl, but wrong was just what she was looking for now.

“My place is just around the corner,” Chase said, breaking the silence.

Only two blocks from Main Street. Wonderful.

“Are you cold?” he asked. Even though she said no, he pushed the Up arrow on the climate control system. “Music?”

She shook her head and he dropped his hand. They had nothing in common, nothing to talk about, but Chase seemed determined.

“Do you live here in town?”

“Mmm-hmm.” His big hand was sitting right there next to her hip. She wanted to pick it up and put it on her knee, maybe run it up the inside of her thigh so she could feel his calluses rasp against the softest part of her body.

They turned onto a narrow side street, and Jane held her breath in anticipation, counting the seconds until Chase slowed and pulled up to a three-story building. His brow furrowed. “I’m not sure my place is clean.”

Jane opened the door and hopped down before he could back out of this. If he backed out, she’d never get the guts to do it again. Clutching her purse, she met him at the driver’s side door, thoroughly enjoying the way his body kept on rising as he stepped onto the driveway and stood straight. God, he was big. “I’m not a neat freak,” she lied. “It’s no problem.”

He unlocked the door to his condo and stuck his head in to look around before swinging it open. “Good news. It looks okay.”

It actually did look okay. A bit bachelor-pad, what with the flat-screen TV complete with multiple gaming systems. But it didn’t smell funny and there weren’t pizza boxes lying around. Just a few newspapers and a coffee cup…plus one pair of muddy steel-toed boots. Why, oh, why, did those make her heart pitter-patter when fine Italian loafers made her lip curl?

She had an illness. Hopefully, sleeping with Chase would work like an immunization. Tetanus shots lasted only ten years. Perhaps degrading sex had the same rate of effectiveness.

Jane wandered toward the black bookshelves while Chase turned on more lights and picked up the papers. Unsurprisingly, the shelves held DVDs instead of books. Hundreds of DVDs. She peered closer. There were action movies, sure, but they were outnumbered by big award winners. Movies like Being John Malkovich and Atonement.

“This was a really good book,” she murmured, running her finger along the edge of a case.

“I don’t read much.”

She didn’t feel a smidgen of surprise at that. Her family had never had books around either.

“So,” he said, the word fading into silence as he walked toward his small kitchen and opened the fridge. “I’ve got a couple of beers in here. You want one?” He was jangling his keys nervously, so Jane decided she’d better give him a task. When she asked for ice water, he looked relieved.

They could draw this out with drinks and awkward conversation, or they could skip all the pretense. Jane moved to the stereo system and the iPod connected to it. She scrolled through the songs, looking for something that fit her mood.

Before Chase had even shut off the faucet, Jane found the perfect album and hit play. Then she turned the volume up and let the bass beat drown out the voice of the woman she was now. Tonight she was going to embrace the bad girl who lurked deep inside.

CHAPTER FOUR

WHEN A HARD LINE OF BASS began to pulse, Chase frowned and turned toward the window, imagining some kid driving by with his speakers blasting. But no, the sound was too clear for that. He glanced at the stereo Jane was moving away from.

“I’m sorry. Did I leave…that…?”

But Jane wasn’t rushing back to find the stop button. She was walking toward him slowly, white suit jacket sliding down her arms. The brown shirt beneath it was silky and sleeveless, but not fitted enough to reveal much more.

“Too warm?” he asked.

“Yes,” Jane answered. Apparently she was way past warm, because she stopped in the middle of the room and reached for the bottom of her shirt, not even pausing before she whipped it over her head. “You were right.”

“Oh?” He couldn’t say more than that. His throat was closing up as his eyes sent images to his brain.

She reached for the side of her skirt and unzipped it. “I do want you as my birthday present. Is that insulting?”

The skirt dropped. Chase felt his eyes bulge. Holy shit. Jane Morgan, Miss Prim and Proper herself, was fucking stacked.

He’d been right to doubt his suspicion that she was plump. She wasn’t plump at all. Her waist was tiny and taut. It curved down to rounded hips, hugged by white lace panties. There was more white lace cupping her full breasts. Naked, she looked less like a wallflower and more like Jessica Rabbit. Especially when she reached up and tugged her hair free of its bun. She shook it out, and waves of glossy brown suddenly curved over her shoulders.

The glass slipped in his hand, and he barely caught it in time. Chase set the water down with a clunk.

“Is it?” supersexy Jane asked.

“Huh?” Her thighs were tight but more than full enough to be womanly.

“Is it insulting that I want you as my present?”

“No. No, it’s not.” In fact, his dick was showing interest in being the main showcase of the gift exchange. He’d seen a porno movie like this once. The serious-looking secretary who was suddenly overcome with lust that transformed her into a sexpot. Chase glanced at the door to be sure no camera crew had arrived.

No, they were alone. The bass line thumped. Jane stepped closer. When he realized that he was standing in his kitchen like an idiot while a half-naked woman beckoned from the living room, Chase moved toward her.

He remembered that kiss as soon as he got close to her. Then he put his hands on her shoulders and found that her skin was even softer than it looked. Holy God.

As he lowered his head, she rose to meet him. This kiss was anything but a tentative exploration. Her tongue met his and slid hard against him as he ran his hands down her back to get his first taste of her curves.

Jane snuck her hands beneath the back of his shirt and started her own exploring. The combination of her hot, soft skin beneath his hands and her fingers sliding over his back had him aching hard within seconds. She pressed closer as if encouraging his arousal, angling her mouth to take him deeper.

Deeper. Oh, hell yeah, he wanted to get deeper.

Sliding his hands lower, he slipped beneath her underwear and found his fingers curving over the most beautiful ass in the world. Not that he’d seen it yet, but it was round and firm and high and it fit his hands like a fantasy.

He spread his fingers wide and pulled her tight against him. When he heard the rasp of his stubble against her chin, Chase lifted his head. “I’m sorry. I forgot to shave.”

“No,” she murmured. “It’s perfect.” Proving that she meant it, Jane dragged her open mouth down his jaw to his neck and sucked at his pulse.

Before he knew it, she’d pushed his shirt up and was trying to lift it over his head. Chase helped her out, even if that did mean giving up his very pleasant holding place.

“Oh, God.” She sighed. “Look at you.”

“Me?” he scoffed, meaning to turn her around to get a view of that ass, but Jane was busy tracing his collarbone with her tongue and he didn’t want to be rude and interrupt. Her wet mouth dragged to his shoulder, where she sucked and bit a path over the wide black swirls of his tattoo. Chase closed his eyes and let her explore, though his hands itched to get back to her skin. He closed them to fists as she sighed against his shoulder and slipped around to his back.

“You are so sexy,” she whispered. He felt the tip of her tongue touch the nape of his neck and Chase shivered. Though he wanted her back in front of him, he let her continue her exploration just for a moment…just long enough for her to run her hot tongue all the way up his neck.

“Jesus.” Sparks of pleasure slipped down his spine. He spun around and slid his hands around her small waist. “You’re fucking gorgeous, Jane.”

“Thank you,” she answered politely, for some reason sinking away from him. It was so impossible that it took a moment for his mind to register that Jane Morgan was going to her knees.

“Jane,” he moaned, thinking he should protest. But his body seized control of his mind and shut it down with brutal efficiency. Jane was on her knees before him, little black glasses still perched on her nose, and she was reaching for the button of his Levi’s.

He’d fallen into some sort of alternative dimension. Been sucked into an X-rated video game. Nothing about this night made sense. Nothing about this current image made sense, but Jane’s fingers were sure and quick, and soon enough she was tugging his zipper down and slipping her hand into his jeans and past his underwear.

Her fingers slid against his bare dick and his breath hissed between his teeth. His whole body tingled with anticipation. He was completely off balance, with no idea what might happen next, and that sense of surprise seemed to push all his blood closer to the surface. Just the faint pressure of her fingertips on his shaft felt like the best sexual experience he’d ever had. And Jane was licking her lips as if there was more to come. Much more.

She tugged his jeans down a little and slipped his dick free, her hand curled firmly around the base. And then, just to complete the fantasy, Jane smiled up at him as if she had just unwrapped the best birthday present in the world.

JANE TRIED NOT to let her hand curl too tightly around his cock. She didn’t want to squeeze too hard and scare the man, but good Lord, he was painfully gorgeous. Thick and hard and swelling even bigger as she watched. The head was wide, but the shaft was even wider.

Her sex pulsed with every beat of her heart. This was a man. With his rough hands and tattoos and thick erection. Her body needed him.

She stroked him slowly, taking in the shape and weight of him. Her mouth watered as she traced a fingertip around the flared head.

“Jane,” he murmured again, and she glanced up at him with a smile as she slipped her glasses off. Then she pressed a chaste kiss to the tip. The muscles of his stomach jumped.

Still smiling, she closed her eyes and tasted him. Just a taste, just a slow swirl of her tongue around the head. He smelled of soap and tasted faintly of the salty fluid that glistened at the tip. “Mmm,” she purred as she parted her lips and pressed a wet kiss.

Then she took him inside her mouth.

“Ah, God,” he groaned. His hand stroked her hair, the calluses catching faintly at the strands. Jane gave herself up to her lust and slid him deep. She licked and sucked him until he was fully primed, until his hand shook against her temple and his breath rushed from his lungs. She wanted more, wanted to keep going, but she couldn’t risk him finishing this way. She had plans for this man, and they didn’t involve sleepy cuddling.

After one last lick, she set him free. “Ready?” she asked.

His eyes opened, but the pupils were wide and distant. “What?”

Laughing, she stood and tilted her head toward the hallway.

“Oh.” He pulled up his boxer briefs and half-zipped his jeans. “I was ready before. Now I’m incoherent.”

“I noticed.”

Chase arched an eyebrow and took one of her hands to tug her toward the bedroom. “You break a man down and then you mock him? That’s cold.”

“Or hot.”

“Yeah,” he agreed with a smile. “Or hot.”

When they crossed the threshold of his bedroom, Jane was still laughing, but he took care of that by pulling her into his arms.

His naked belly touched hers and his arms circled her waist as they kissed again. He was an excellent kisser, even more so now that he was turned on and losing control. The thrusting of his tongue got Jane even wetter than she had been.

She felt the slide of his hands up her back, felt his fingers work briefly at her bra before the straps fell free. Jane inched away and let it slide down her arms.

Power coursed through her as she watched his reaction. Men liked her breasts. They were large, a full size D, and she could see Chase’s appreciation in the widening of his eyes and the parting of his lips. She shouldn’t feel powerful because of that. Men liked breasts. She hadn’t accomplished anything admirable by shrugging off her bra, but Jane still raised her chin and arched her back and reveled in the lust in his eyes.

“Damn,” he breathed, starting to reach for her, but Jane put her hand to his naked chest and pushed him back until his legs touched the mattress. He sat down hard, still gazing up at her breasts.

Jane toed off her heels, then pushed down her lace panties.

“Damn,” Chase repeated, this time with a smile. “You should be arrested for hiding under all those clothes, Miss Jane. You look like a wet dream walking.”

“Oh, yeah? So you think it’d be a good idea to show a little cleavage to the surveyors every morning?”

“Um… Okay, you’re right. Stay buttoned up.”

She curved her hands over her breasts and squeezed lightly. “What about the contractors? You think they’d like the view?”

“Yeah, I think I’m gonna buy you some baggy cardigans for your birthday.”

Laughing, she sauntered toward the bed. She’d forgotten that Chase was funny as well as sexy.

“Seriously,” Chase breathed, pupils dilating again as she drew near, “I had no idea.”

“So why’d you ask me out?”

He glanced up. Briefly. “I thought you were cute in an intimidating kind of way.”

She stopped before him and put her hands on her hips. “And now?”

“Now I think you’re hot as hell…in an intimidating kind of way. Come ’ere.”

His hands curved around her waist and pulled her between his knees. The stubble on his jaw dragged over the curve of her breast before she felt his mouth close over her nipple. Wet heat pulled her tight inside. Though she tried to twist her hands into his hair, Jane found that it was too short, and she had to settle for spreading her fingers over his head and pulling him closer.

His hand closed over her other breast and squeezed the nipple hard.

Gasping, she let her head fall back as he licked and sucked. Suddenly his other hand was between her thighs, the edge of his fingers sliding over her sex.

His sharp gasp cooled her nipple and Jane bit back a laugh. She’d just gotten waxed last week, and he couldn’t have suspected that. But she was glad she had, because she could feel even the smallest movement of his roughened fingers against that tender skin. Her amusement vanished when his thumb brushed her clit.

Oh, God, yes. She was so turned on. Like nothing she’d felt with any of her recent boyfriends. This was wrong. Wicked. She didn’t even know his first name. And that was why she loved it. Being bad had been her favorite hobby years ago, and it seemed she still had the knack for it.

He stroked her, his fingers sliding easily over her wetness, delving deeper, rubbing tension into her belly. Jane set one knee on the bed, then the other, straddling his legs and forcing him to lie back.

Scooting higher, she pressed her knees on either side of his hips and leaned down to kiss him. When his hand slid up her thigh and found her sex again, she whimpered. When he pressed a finger slowly inside her, Jane moaned and tilted her hips.

He felt so good as he slid in and out, in and out. She sucked his tongue and groaned in encouragement. The encouragement worked. Chase eased another finger in, stretching her tight.

“Oh, God,” she moaned. “Oh, yes. Yes.”

“I want inside you,” he murmured.

Biting her lip, Jane nodded. She wanted it, too. His thick shaft and smooth head. All of it. She eased off the edge of the bed as he toed off his shoes and dug in the pocket of his jeans for a condom. He’d come to the bar prepared. When she saw the wrapper in his hand, Jane pulled the jeans down his legs and tossed them aside.

Finally he was naked, and the rest of his body finished the glorious picture he’d presented before. Nice. Very nice.

Jane climbed back on and took the condom from him. Biting her lip in concentration, she carefully rolled it on, giving him a few extra strokes while she was at it. But she didn’t linger. She was too darn horny to wait any longer, so she pushed up and positioned herself right over his cock.

Chase held his shaft steady and spread one hand over her hip to ease her slowly down. At first he slipped easily in, but when the thickest part of him reached her, Jane held her breath at the pressure. She didn’t want to breathe or think or even sigh. She just wanted to feel.

“You okay?” he rasped.

Nodding, she lowered her hips another inch.

“Oh, Jesus,” he groaned, grabbing her hips with both hands. He eased her up, then down again, sinking himself deeper.

She was panting now, giving up any attempt to hold her breath. A few moments later she’d taken him all the way, and her sex was too full and too tight…and it felt glorious.

Chase’s blunt fingers dug into her hips.

She waited a moment, letting herself adjust. She hadn’t had a man this big in a long time. And he looked like her custom-made personal fantasy, stretched out beneath her. The black whorls of his tattoo wrapped around his arm and curved over his shoulder. She knew now that the tattoo spread over his shoulder blade before climbing up his spine. God, he was lovely. Hard and strong.

He watched her carefully, face serious and waiting. When she squeezed the muscles of her sex, air hissed through his teeth, and Jane smiled. He was powerful, but sensitive, too, like a muscle car precision-tuned to respond to the slightest bit of pressure.

Jane rolled her hips, rising at the same time before easing down. Oh, God, yes. She set the rhythm, working herself against his rock-hard shaft.

His hands left her hips and rose to cup her breasts, his thumbs dragging hard over her nipples. Jane arched her back, rolling her hips.

“Ah, Christ,” he groaned. “You’ve got muscles everywhere.”

“Pilates.” She sighed, dropping her hips harder against him.

He rose to meet her, driving deep, pinching her nipples hard. Her soul swelled inside her, pushing out until her body felt too small.

This was who she was. She wasn’t a cold, controlled businesswoman who didn’t need a man. She was a hot, needful thing who reveled in using and being used in turn. This was who she really was, deep inside. A woman proud of her big breasts and curvy ass. A woman who thrilled at inspiring easy lust in strange men.

She took him faster; her hips fell harder.

“Fuck!” he growled. His arms wrapped around her and the world shifted, and suddenly Jane found herself on her back.

If she’d thought him deep before, she’d been mistaken. Now he slid deep and true and hard, pounding into her.

“Oh…” She sighed. “Oh, yes.” She dug her nails into his ass in case he wasn’t listening.

He fucked her harder, nothing shallow or fast about it.

Chase hooked his arm under her knee and pulled her leg higher. Suddenly he was hitting the exact right spot. A spot she’d forgotten about in the past few years.

“Chase.”

His back grew slick under her grasping hands. His hips slapped into her.

“Yes,” she panted. “Yes. Yes.”

Finally that familiar pressure began to build high in her sex, and every brutal thrust rubbed against it. “Chase!” she screamed, pulling him closer, knowing she was scratching him and not caring in the least. She was too busy coming her heart out, her hips jerking hard against his thrusts.

She was still distant, floating high above herself, when he roared and drove into her one last time…and then all she could feel was her heart pounding and her breath rushing from her tight throat and his limbs sliding slick and sweaty against hers.

Wow, her mind whimpered. Oh, wow. Just…wow.

He was breathing even harder than her, his forehead pressed into the mattress next to her ear. Aware now of her clutching fingers, Jane relaxed her hands and smoothed them over his back. His breath hitched. She pressed a tiny kiss to the edge of his tattoo, hoping he wouldn’t notice and mistake it for attachment.

That had been…amazing. Unbelievable. Sure, she’d wanted some sort of sexual miracle. She’d wanted him rough and big and dirty and, most important, good in bed. But there’d been a small chance he could’ve been just as awful in bed as Greg.

It was a chance she’d been willing to take. And it had paid off in spades.

Chase slid his arm free and let her leg fall back to the mattress. Slowly, slowly he slipped out of her body before rolling to his side with a groan.

Parts of her ached. Parts that hadn’t ached in a very long time. Jane quietly stretched, listening to her muscles sing. Oh, yeah.

“Jane?” Chase whispered.

She tilted her head toward him.

“Damn. That was… Damn.”

“Yeah.” She smiled. “Thank you.”

“No, thank you.”

Well, on top of everything else he was polite.

“Are you hungry?” he asked. Hungry? Before she could shake her head, he nodded. “I’m starving. I’m going to jump in the shower and then I’ll make us a snack. Stay there.”

Jane felt a twinge of stark regret. She didn’t want to get up yet. Her muscles were still warm and melting. And Chase was being surprisingly…sweet.

He pushed up from the bed and walked toward the bathroom.

“Chase?”

He tossed a smile over his tattooed shoulder. “Yeah?”

What could she say? You’re amazing? You’re wonderful? I’m sorry for what I’m about to do? Jane cleared her throat. “Thanks for celebrating my birthday with me.”

Chase winked. “You’re pretty fucking welcome. I’ll be right back and we can celebrate again if you want.”

Letting her head sink to the mattress, Jane sighed. Where did he get so much energy? She’d never seen a guy so wide-awake after sex, and he was putting a crimp in her plan.

The shower started. The bathroom echoed with the sound of his whistling. Whistling? Jane frowned at the ceiling. He should have just rolled off her and started snoring. Then she could have gotten out of here without the guilt that was twisting through her chest.

“Crud,” Jane groused, but as soon as she heard the shower door thud closed, she got up, pulled on her clothes and walked out.

“Thank you, Chase,” she whispered as she closed the door. It had been a lovely fantasy, but now she had to get back to her real life. Or her fake life. Whatever it was, Chase didn’t fit into it.

CHAPTER FIVE

THERE WAS NO QUESTION about it. Her real life sucked donkeys. And her brother was an asshole.

She winced at the uncharitable, vulgar thought about the little boy she’d spent countless hours babysitting. He’d been a sweet kid. Too sweet. Their mother had let him get away with murder, hiding his transgressions from his father.

But apparently the police didn’t think he was cute. He hadn’t been released. And on top of that, Jane was spending her Saturday at her parents’ house, watching the sheriff serve a search warrant.

She snuck a peek at her stepfather, who was leaning against the kitchen counter, looking as if he didn’t want to be in his own home.

If her mother had made Mac aware, he wouldn’t have let Jessie get away with things like shoplifting gum from the gas station or lying to his teachers about why he hadn’t done his homework.

But Mom had always loved bad boys, of course. And her enabling love had let Jessie grow up into a slacker who figured he could charm his way out of anything. If it wasn’t for the large and very intimidating presence of his father, Jessie probably would have been a complete waste. As it was, he at least pretended to try to find a job.

But now the deputies were getting ready to search Jessie’s room and the rest of the basement. They hadn’t gotten access to the rest of the house, anyway, and that just might save her stepdad’s sanity.

Mac crossed his arms, face red and eyes narrowed. He’d backed into the kitchen, separating himself from everyone to help control his temper, a gesture Jane recognized. His appearance was frightening and his temper was real, but he’d spent the past twenty years doing everything he could to stay out of prison. His quiet anger filled the room, but he didn’t give it a voice.

Her mom, on the other hand, cried loudly, hands clutching the warrant. “But he didn’t do anything!” Her conviction was incredibly real considering she had no idea why the cops were there.

They were from the county sheriff’s department, but the warrant had come from Aspen. At least the family knew where Jessie was being held now—right in Jane’s backyard.

“All right,” Jane said to the female deputy keeping her company, the one making sure she didn’t destroy any evidence. Her mother had her own personal keeper and the biggest deputy was stationed near the kitchen, eyes on Mac. “Please tell me what he’s been charged with.”

“He was arrested by the Aspen P.D., ma’am. You’ll have to contact them.”

“Of course,” she muttered. “Mom, let me see the warrant.”

A crash sounded from the basement, and Jane threw a concerned glance at Mac, who took a deep breath and turned to face the wall. Her mother sobbed.

“Mom, please keep it down. Dad is upset enough, all right?”

Her mom nodded and sniffed hard, trying to control herself.

“I’m going to read the warrant, and then I’m going to try to get in touch with someone at the Aspen police department, okay? Now that we know where he is, we’ll be able to find out the charges, no problem. It’s all public record. And they must have set bail already.”

“I know.” Her mom sighed. Of course she did. They were all well versed in the ins and outs of the justice system.

The warrant was enlightening. The police were searching for stolen goods that related to an ongoing investigation. The belongings of two women were listed: purses, credit cards, cash and licenses.

Crud. An ongoing investigation. Not good. Jane looked at the hunched shoulders of her stepfather and cringed. Mac was going to be past furious.

“Do you know about the stolen-goods investigation?” Jane asked the deputy.

The woman gave her an impassive look. “You’ll need to contact the Aspen P.D., ma’am.”

“Yes, I got that, thanks.”

She waded through the last of the scarce information in the warrant before shaking her head. “This is ridiculous,” she muttered. “Jessie’s no thief.”

As if on cue, a deputy emerged from the basement staircase with a big plastic bag. It wasn’t empty.

Mac’s mouth tightened. “Call Aspen,” he growled, causing his guard to shift nervously. Mac’s brown hair was peppered with gray, but he still looked dangerous as hell. His green eyes shot daggers at the cop, and his big arms warned that he could back his rage up with power. The blue-black stains of the tattoos on his arms gave a warning, too—one any cop would recognize. Here was a man who’d spent a good part of his life in prison.

Jane dialed information and turned to face the corner for a small sense of privacy. The black lacquer end table was polished to a shine and reflected her own anxious face back at her.

She’d lost her adventurous side over the course of the past few hours. Now she was pale and plain again, her mouth pinched, her forehead creased with worry. She looked like a woman who’d never enjoyed so much as a decadent dessert, much less a big animal of a man.

As she spoke to the receptionist at the police department and then got transferred to another desk and then another, Jane watched her own face grow tighter, her features twisting into fear as she talked.

By the time she hung up, her reflection had gone blurry with angry tears.

“Mom,” she whispered as she turned to face the room. No one heard her. Another deputy passed by on his journey from the basement to the vehicles parked outside. “Dad,” she said.

Mac lifted his head and looked at her.

She swallowed hard and lifted the phone a little, as if that would explain her horror.

“What is it?” he asked.

Jane shook her head and swallowed again, finally getting her throat clear enough to speak. “Jessie… I got through to a detective in Aspen. He said…he said that Jessie was stopped for speeding and suspicion of driving under the influence. He was arrested for possession of marijuana, and when they searched the car they found stolen credit cards. Several of them. He’s been charged with multiple counts of theft…and felony grand larceny.”

Her mother groaned. Mac spit out a curse. And all three deputies in the room moved their hands toward their guns.

For nearly twenty years Jane had managed to steer clear of anything even resembling a jail or a prison. She’d even avoided seeing friends in the hospital, because the ugly floors and echoing halls reminded her of uniforms and shackles. She wasn’t sure quite how many hours she’d spent in prison visiting rooms as a child, but it had been way past the point of too many.

Jane Morgan’s twenty-year reprieve was over. She was heading right back to where she’d started.

IT SMELLED OF CEMENT. Not a bad smell, she supposed, unless one had to live with it for years at a time. No grass, no flowers, no baking cookies. Not even utilitarian things like exhaust or freshly cut wood. At least when they went out to the yard in winter they could smell the sharp freshness of falling snow.

The last time she’d been in a visiting room, she’d been too young to understand the horror of this. At the time she’d been more concerned with the itchy lace on her new dress and the frightening appearance of her mother’s newest love interest.

But now the sadness of the place fell upon her like a wave. The Aspen police department was clean and modern, but that didn’t change the brutal truth. Some of these people would be leaving after a few hours behind bars. Some would be here for a couple of years, serving sentences for minor crimes. And for some, jail was just a way station on the way to state or federal prison.

Please don’t let that be Jessie.

A loud clank echoed through the small visiting room, and Jane looked up to see Jessie shuffling out in an orange jumpsuit, his eyes bright with anxiety. “Hey, sis,” he mouthed as he took his seat.

“Dad’s not here?” he asked as soon as Jane picked up the phone.

“No, it’s just me.”

“Okay, good.”

“Jessie, what the hell were you thinking?”

“I don’t know.” His blond hair flopped over his brow when he shook his head.

“If they’ve found stolen goods in Dad’s house… He’s a convicted felon, you idiot!”

“I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. I got pulled over for speeding, and the cop found some…” His eyes darted to the side and he leaned forward as if they weren’t separated by thick glass. “He found some pot and a few credit cards, okay?”

“Not your cards, I assume.”

“No,” he said sullenly.

“If they think Dad’s involved in some sort of identity-theft ring—”

“It’s nothing like that, all right? I just lifted a few purses from Ryders.”

“You’re a selfish idiot!”

He stiffened. “I’m sorry. I needed some cash, all right?”

“And some credit cards?”

He shrugged, the same expression on his face that he’d worn when he’d been suspended from sixth grade for a week. Sullen anxiety.

“Why didn’t you call us? Bail was set on Friday!”

“It doesn’t matter,” he muttered. “Sixty thousand is too much and Dad won’t pay it anyway.”

Well, he was likely right about that. And Jane probably wouldn’t front the bond money either, because lately Jessie was just the type to say “Screw it!” and head off for a vacation in Mexico.

“Is there anything else you need to tell me? Anything else they might have found in your room?”

“No, nothing. They keep asking me about some girl, but I’ve never heard of her.”

The hair on the nape of her neck stood up. “What girl?”

“Some girl named Michelle something. She must’ve had her purse stolen.”

“Did you take it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

Jane lost her last thread of patience. “Well, how many purses have you stolen, Jessie?”

“I don’t know. Like fifteen or something. Girls put them on the floor at Ryders when they want to dance. They just leave them there like fucking idiots.”

Fifteen? The contents of fifteen purses would easily be worth more than a thousand dollars, making the crime a felony. “Oh, yeah. They’re the idiots. Have they assigned you an attorney?”

“They gave me some papers to fill out for a court-appointed guy.”

“Don’t talk to the cops unless he’s present. I’ll do my best to find you a good lawyer by Monday, okay? And I’m going to try to find out more about this Michelle. Don’t say anything else.”

“All right.” He flinched when the one-minute bell sounded. “Tell Mom and Dad I’m sorry, all right?”

“I will. But you’d better start thinking about what you’re going to do when they release you. Dad’s not going to let you back in the house.”

He nodded and the tip of his nose turned red as if he was holding back tears. “I’m sorry, sis. Honestly. I didn’t mean…” One of the cops began to approach from the other side of the room.

“I love you, Jessie.”

“Yeah, me too.” The officer took the phone from his hand and hung it up. Jessie’s eyes were damp, but he put on a crooked smile as the guard grabbed his elbow to urge him up.

She tried to catch the man’s eye, but he didn’t look at her. She was no one. Just some piece of trash involved with a criminal. She remembered that, too. The way the officers would look through her and her mother, or—worse—glare at them or shake their heads in disgust.

Jane hung up the phone and pushed numbly to her feet. It was Saturday afternoon and she had to find Jessie a better lawyer. Her mom couldn’t do it. She played possum in the face of trouble—she always had. And her stepfather wasn’t the type to work the phones and puzzle out a problem. He was strong and steady and worked with his hands.

Jane was the one who lived in Aspen. She was the one who’d been dating a man in the D.A.’s office.

She’d hardly spent any time at home for the past few years, had tried her best to separate herself from them without giving them up entirely. Maybe if she’d spent more time with Jessie he wouldn’t have turned into a thief. Maybe if she hadn’t turned her back on him, he wouldn’t have thought it was okay to steal money from careless women.

But whatever he’d grown into, he was still her brother even if she’d never consider introducing him to her friends. He was her brother and he still had a good heart…and she’d help him if she could find a way.

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