"Nothing," she whispered, then unzipped his pants. And told herself this made the night no less dreamy. Everything would still be perfect in the end.

The next morning, Jake rowed his pirogue up the bayou, Stephanie seated across from him. Hers had sunk during the night.

He loved the bayou in the early morning. Before the heat of the day pervaded, the sights and sounds around the water made him feel like the world was fresh, being born all over again. Lily pads sporting white blooms sprinkled the water to one side of the boat; duckweed, rimmed by elephant ears at the shoreline, floated on the other. A snowy egret soared past near the bank and drew Jake's attention to a caiman stretched out in the mud by the shore.

"Little cocodrie," he said, pointing, for Stephanie's benefit.

She tensed slightly, and he chuckled.

"No worries, chère. No leaks in my boat."

She cast a sheepish smile, tilting her head. "I thought Louisiana had alligators, not crocodiles."

He nodded. "But my ancestors didn't know the difference, started callin' 'em cocodries and it stuck."

"Mmm," she said, seeming to relax, turning to study the small, dark caiman where it rested still as a statue. Never scared for long, his Miss Chardonnay.

They'd had sex twice more before falling asleep last night—the same slow, sensual sex as the first time, but with each liaison she'd grown a little more daring, planting her hands on his ass to pull him deeper inside her, once wrapping her legs around his back. Common fare for most people, but not for Stephanie—he knew without her saying so. He felt like she'd been a closed-up little flower and last night he'd watched her begin to blossom, stretching her petals a little wider each time they connected.

And she had a lovely little bottom, but that wasn't really why he'd been checking it out last night. For some reason, even when she'd said no, he'd had to see for himself that she didn't have a flower tattooed there—like in one of the dreams.

One more sign you're losing your mind, once and for all. He gave his head a short shake with the realization that fife had seemed a little off-kilter since the moment Stephanie Grant had arrived. Then again, life hadn't exactly been on-kilter before that, so maybe he was just imagining things.

The second time they'd made love had been after his little examination of her rear. The third time after he'd woken from the dream—in total shock.

Because why the hell was he still having erotic, needful dreams when he'd just gotten the satisfaction his body had clearly needed so damn bad? He'd been sure it was simple lust causing the dreams, that they'd been nothing more than wishes in the night, because he couldn't have her. But now he could have her, had had her, so the dream had left him feeling more disturbed than usual.

After dreaming of sex, it had seemed natural to reach for her. The room had been dark, the lamp extinguished, only a thin ribbon of moonglow lighting his way. And like the dream—God, how the need had struck him, like something new and overwhelming. He'd been glad they were both half asleep, glad her sighs of pleasure came with closed eyes, glad she couldn't see the emotion surely dripping from his face. He still didn't understand it and it was damn unsettling.

A blue dragonfly buzzed, flitting in between them in the boat before darting away, and the silence began to bother him. He was normally content to go hours without speaking, even if he was with someone, but he supposed this was just part of feeling uncertain about last night. "You're quiet," he said.

"Tired," she replied softly, offering a smile. "You wore me out."

His own grin escaped, unbidden. He liked the idea of having caused her exhaustion. They'd definitely had that hot, slow, all-night-long sex he'd been thinking about lately.

'Tell me about the house," she said.

He raised his eyes to her—she was pretty in the morning, even sans makeup and hairbrush, high pink color lighting her cheekbones. "Already told you about the house."

"No, about the work you're doing on it. The new floor in the kitchen and the new sink. Are you going to move back out here or something?"

No, just run away to it whenever I can. "It's just a weekend place for me now," he said instead.

"And you're doing all the refurbishing yourself?"

He nodded. Hard physical labor makes it so I think less and sleep better. It fills the days when I have nothing else to fill them. "It's cheap that way."

She looked down at the boat they floated in and said, "How do you get the materials out there? Surely not in this?"

He laughed softly. "No, beb. There's a road leads up to the front of the house. But if I'm not haulin' anything, takin' the water cuts the trip by half."

"You love it there." Not a question, a statement.

"Yeah, it's . .." Safe. Private. Far away from the bad stuff. "It's home."

She glanced down at her toes for a minute, then met his gaze. "I'm glad I followed you last night."

He let the corners of his mouth turn up just slightly. "Me too, chère." Much to my surprise.

Up ahead, a clearing split the elderberry bushes and willows that hugged the shore. The landing came into view and Jake angled the boat toward it.

Five minutes later, he'd locked up the pirogue and was shutting her into her car. Her window lowered immediately and her blue eyes pierced him. "I wish I could ride back with you."

He didn't know what to say to that, so he stooped next to the sedan, rested his bent arms on the door, and gave her a warm—but short—kiss.

She tilted her head, offering a soft laugh. "That was a horrible thing to say. It sounded so high school."

"Not so horrible," he admitted. Even though he thought it was probably good for them to be parting ways now. Because no matter what he'd felt with her last night, it still didn't—couldn't—mean anything. Good sex. Great sex. That was all. "You'll need to follow me back, make sure you don't lose your way."

She nodded. "But can you slow down a little, Speed Racer? I had a hell of a time keeping up with you last night."

He laughed. "Sure, beb. I'll make sure I keep you in my rearview 'til we get back to town."

And then? She didn't ask, but the question hung in the air.

"I'll drop by to get Tina's pictures from you later, or tomorrow sometime."

She nodded. And he relaxed a little. He'd added the "or tomorrow" part so she'd understand he wouldn't be sharing a bed with her again tonight. He couldn't say he wouldn't be doing it again sometime, but he had no plans to let this become an every-night thing.

Even so, when she said, "Good-bye, Jake—and about last night, thank you for being so patient with me," impulse drove him to lean through the window for one more kiss, this one complete with tongues and her soft sigh, shooting heat straight to his groin.

"No, chère, thank you."

They exchanged a quick last look that spoke of fresh desire and propelled him away from her and into his truck before he did anything stupid like open her door and drag her into the backseat. What they'd shared had been damn hot, but the guilt was beginning to set in now.

Starting the old truck, he reached down to shift gears, then circled around Stephanie's car and headed up the gravel road away from the bayou.

Being with another woman was one thing, but being with another woman and experiencing so much emotion, that sense of attachment—that felt like betrayal. Even if Becky wasn't around to feel betrayed anymore. As he braked at the end of the unpaved thoroughfare, it felt almost as if Becky sat next to him in the truck, knowing what he'd done—knowing how bad he'd wanted Stephanie, and how good it had all felt... in more than just a physical way.

That was it—he was losing it. Ghosts in the Quarter, that was one thing. But ghosts in the damn truck with him? He had to be out of his mind. Becky wasn't here. The sad, still-painful truth was ... Becky wasn't anywhere.

But he had to move on, didn't he? Wasn't Tony always saying that? His mother too. "She'd want you to be happy," his mom always said—most recently over fried chicken at the tiny table in her little kitchen, the place still smelling of peroxide and perm solution.

"If she could have what she wanted," he'd replied, "she'd still be here with me." They would still live in the little house he'd been refurbishing, she'd still be teaching second grade at the little school nearby. Life would still be great.

Jake shook his head. Sometimes that life seemed a world away, like something he'd made up, or just dreamed. He'd never expected to find someone like Becky, someone who'd made him feel so good about himself, someone who'd had enough goodness for both of them—she'd made him a better man than he'd been before her.

Other days, he woke up still not quite believing it was all gone and that he'd sold the house and traded in the car and moved into a shithole because it didn't matter where he lived anymore.

Shake this off man. Stephanie had made him feel so good last night—why couldn't he just be happy about that?

You have to try.

He wasn't sure where the words came from, but it was as if they'd been whispered in his ear. He knew they were true. He had to believe it was okay to have had astounding sex with Stephanie. Mostly, he had to believe it was okay to do it again—because even as anxious as he'd been to get in his truck and put that little bit of distance between them, he already wanted more.

He had to believe something else, too. He had to believe he could find Tina Grant. Because he had to now. He had to give Stephanie her sister back. He didn't think he could bear it if he let her down.

Just then, he remembered she was following him and glanced in his rearview mirror. Damn—he could barely make out her car a good distance behind. He stepped on the brake and berated himself. You 're thinking about the woman so much you forgot about her.

Within thirty seconds she came speeding up behind him. He slowed to a crawl so that she came up even closer, then rolled down his window and hung his head out to yell, "Sorry, beb."

"Good thing you're not still a cop," she yelled in reply, "or you'd have to give yourself a ticket."

He smiled at her in his mirror, saw her smile back. Felt it warm his heart. And the insides of his thighs. After which he pressed the gas pedal, because he was already starting to think it would be easy just to stop here, just pull off the quiet roadway and relieve that ache with her one last time before they headed back to the city.

But he already had enough guilt eating at him—he didn't need any more.

"Bye for now, chère," he murmured in the mirror, then tried to concentrate on what else he could do to look for Tina as he headed back toward New Orleans.

Stephanie pushed through the door to her room feeling like a new woman. A satisfied woman. A woman who finally understood what the fuss over sex was all about.

She fell onto the bed, giggling like a teenager after her first kiss. Hugging a velvet bolster, she lay staring at the ceiling, reefing in the wonder of it all. Oh God, it had been so good! The memory made her let out a sexy little growl. And Jake had been so patient, so sweet—and so utterly incredible.

She wished she could tell Tina. Her sister popped to mind instantly—the only female Stephanie was close to who she knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, would get this, and would think it was as wonderful as she did.

Where are you, Tina?

On impulse, she tossed the round pillow aside and reached for the bedside phone. She dialed her own number in Chicago, keying in the code to retrieve messages as she did every day, just in case her sister had left something on her answering machine. But still no Tina.

Dropping the phone back in its cradle, she went to her laptop. She doubted Tina would e-mail her—mainly because she doubted Tina was anyplace where she had computer access. Yet she longed to talk to her sister so badly right now that she couldn't help checking every possible method of contact.

Nothing in her e-mailbox looked promising, though, and her stomach churned at the sight of all the new messages from Grable & Harding. Yech. Clenching her teeth in distaste, she opened the first to find one of her coworkers just needed a quick answer on something. She typed in a response and sent it off. The next message, however, wasn't as simple and would take some time. Nor was the next. Or the next.

The last message was from Curtis. She grimaced at seeing his name.

S—

Bad news. Things are getting sticky with the phone co. campaign. Rod Hartman there is wondering where you are and seems shaky about dealing with anyone else. Can you call him and put his mind at ease?

And while you 're at it, can you call ME and put MY mind at ease, too? I really miss you, and feel awfully out of touch. Would like to hear your voice and know you 're okay. Hate that I don't really know what you 're doing down there, even as much as I respect your privacy. Will wait to hear from you.

C

Stephanie leaned back in the desk chair, sucked in a deep breath, and let it back out. Talk about a killjoy. What timing.

But the truth was, she'd been neglecting her job. She hadn't thought about Grable & Harding in a couple of days, in fact. That was so unlike her she could scarcely believe it—but somehow things that had seemed of dire importance a week ago had faded into the background for her now.

Time to settle down and put on her work cap. Although she didn't look forward to phoning Rod Hartman—and first, she should call Curtis at the office. She didn't especially want to do that, either.

But she forced herself to pick up the phone and dial his direct line. This would be the hardest part of her day, so she might as well get it over with.

"Curtis Anderson." His all-business tone.

"It's Stephanie." Did she sound different? she wondered. Would he hear the same soft lilt in her voice, left over from sex, as she did?

His response was one of relief. "Stephanie, thank God. I was getting worried."

She glanced back at her computer screen to see his message had arrived yesterday morning. "Sorry," she said, attempting to swallow her guilt. "I was... busy with the Tina situation all day yesterday."

"Any chance you could fill me in on exactly what Tina's situation is?"

The question rubbed her the wrong way, his attitude implying her sister was a bother. And that was probably her fault, because before all this, she had likely painted Tina as immature and reckless, but that didn't soften the sting. She pulled in her breath and tried to speak calmly. "Look, the situation is just... that she followed a boyfriend down here and I want her to come home."

"And it's taken this long?" When she didn't answer right away, he kept talking. "Listen, Stephanie, I hate to be the bad guy, but your leave of absence isn't coming off well. People keep asking me what's wrong, and I don't have any answers. They end up thinking you're having personal problems, or health problems—God forbid. And yesterday Stan asked if I thought you were coming back at all or if this was your way of leaving the company."

That should have alarmed her. Should have had her packing her bags—now. At the very least, it should have her ready to call Stan Grable and convince him of her intense loyalty to Grable & Harding.

But instead, it only pissed her off. "This is the thanks I get for pouring my blood, sweat, and tears into this company for the past nine years? Why don't you ask Stan if he knows how many vacation days I've never used, or how many times I've dragged myself into the office sick because I thought I should be there. This is the one thing I've ever asked of Grable and Harding, and if they can't give it to me, they can just go to hell."

Curtis simply stayed silent, finally saying, "Are you done?"

"I suppose."

"Don't think I haven't been singing your praises and trying to convince people everything's fine, because I have. I've watched you come a long way in this company and I don't want you to lose it just because you feel the need to control your sister's life."

She gasped. He sounded just like Jake—in the beginning. A part of her wished she could tell Curtis the truth about Tina's disappearance and see if he thought she was just being a controlling older sister then. But it was none of his business. "There's more to it than you know," she said simply.

"I miss you."

/ slept with another man last night and had the most mind-blowing sex of my life. "I... appreciate that." Under the circumstances, she couldn't return the sentiment.

"I see." Which meant he'd noticed.

She let out a long sigh, not knowing what to say. "I... should go."

"Are you going to smooth things over with Rod Hart-man?"

"Yes," she snapped. She shouldn't be so offended— she'd just admitted to herself that she'd been neglecting her work. Still, everything about this phone call had irked her.

"Stephanie," he said, his voice going softer.

"Yeah?"

Damn, a knock on the door. Probably Mrs. Lindman delivering fresh towels. She walked over, stretching the phone cord, as Curtis said, "I'm sorry if you're mad at me. Being apart is hard on our relationship." She opened the door as he said, "Tell me things are okay between us, will you?"

Jake stood on the other side.

She sucked in her breath, still holding the receiver to her ear. "Hi," she breathed, wondering how horrific her expression was. She suddenly felt like she'd been cheating on both of them, even though she didn't think it true in either case.

"What?" Curtis asked.

"Um, hold on." She covered the mouthpiece and looked up at Jake expectantly.

He lowered his chin. "Catch you at a bad time, beb?"

The worst. Curtis seems to think I really care for him and wants to hear me say it. "Not at all." She shook her head. "Just talking to work."

"I came for Tina's pictures. Turns out I'm meetin' Tony for lunch—thought it might be a good idea to have 'em in case anything new comes up."

"Oh. Of course." She looked around and found the evening bag she'd carried to the lounge last night still lying on her dresser. Setting down the phone, she snapped it open, drew the photos out, and returned to the door, wishing like hell she could pick the phone back up and cover the mouthpiece without it seeming weird. "Here. And thanks."

"I'll be in touch soon," he said, his brown eyes half shut and sexy as hell as he leaned in, curled one hand around her neck, and bent down for a searing hot tongue kiss.

As he turned to go, she stood there breathless, wondering if it was possible to hear a kiss over the phone. One like that, she thought, maybe.

She bit her hp as she picked up the receiver. "I'm back," she said, thinking she sounded ridiculously breathy. "Sorry," she tried to say louder, clearing her throat.

"What's happening there?"

"Just had someone at the door. Nothing important." Except hot and heavy desire.

"Is everything okay between us, Stephanie?"

She closed her eyes and wished the question away. It didn't go.

She'd have to tell him the truth, but not now, like this. When the hell had Curtis started thinking this was more than casual dating? "Everything's fine," she said. "But I'd better get to work. Talk soon. Bye."

"So what the hell brought this on?"

Jake lowered his po'boy to the plate and looked across the table at Tony. "Huh?"

"Lunch," Tony clarified.

"I gotta eat, no?" He picked the sandwich back up and took a bite.

Tony only laughed, and Jake understood why, but he feigned ignorance since he didn't have an explanation. He and Tony ate lunch together at least once every couple of weeks, but always at his friend's insistence, and he usually made Tony pick something up to bring to his place so he wouldn't have to go out. Today, he'd called Tony's cell and left a message to meet him at a greasy spoon near the French Market.

"Well, whatever the case, it's good to see you getting out a little. Although you could've put on some clean clothes." He gave Jake a critical once-over.

"Slept out at the bayou house. Didn't get around to changin' when I got back." He purposely left out the part about being up most of the night making a beautiful woman whimper and moan. That was getting difficult enough to accept as the hours passed anyway.

But he'd decided he knew why he'd had the dream again—and the reason was equally as disturbing as the sex. As much as he'd wanted Stephanie, as much as he'd even let himself have her, he knew in his heart that he hadn't truly let himself go with her, the way he would have if he'd met her seven or eight years ago. He hadn't let go of the stuff inside him. He thought maybe the dream was telling him he should let go of the guilt pummeling him; maybe it was telling him it was all okay.

Jake Broussard, dream analyst. He rolled his eyes, glad Tony had been late and was now distracted with the menu—he hadn't noticed Jake looking downcast. Not that Tony wasn't used to seeing him downcast, but anytime he could escape a lecture, it was welcome.

And it wasn't anything Tony could help him with anyway. He felt torn inside—ripped down the middle. He wasn't even close to being ready to care for another woman, and where all that tenderness had come from, he hadn't a clue. He hadn't known there was anything like that left in him after Becky. And he couldn't help it, he felt like he'd forsaken her. He'd never expected to share anything like that with a woman ever again—and he couldn't help thinking he shouldn't have.

After Tony placed his order and shoved a laminated menu back behind the napkin holder, he said, "Anything happening at Sophia's?"

Jake shook his head. "I've been off the last few nights, but nothin' unusual comin' down lately."

Jake would have worked harder to get to the bottom of the drugs-at-Sophia's theory if he'd still been a cop. Or if he thought bringing down a couple of midlevel pushers would really make a difference in anyone's life—because he felt that was the best they'd ever do; they'd never get to Typhoeus.

As it was, he only kept his eyes open at Chez Sophia for Tony's sake, out of friendship. And anytime old instincts kicked back in and made him feel like a cop on the prowl, hungry to bring somebody down, he reminded himself that in the big picture it didn't matter, and it didn't pay to care.

"Do me a favor," Tony said, then asked him to keep an ear to the ground on a couple of third-floor regulars, explaining they'd ended up on his radar because "they have more money than they should," even though one had a high-paying job and the other ran a successful car dealership. "It has to be coming in from somewhere else."

"I'll see what I can do," Jake said, "but I need you to return the favor."

Tony raised his eyebrows until Jake whipped out a color copy he'd made of Tina's photos, side by side, and underneath he'd written down her vital information. "I need you to keep lookin' for this girl."

Tony gave a nod. "Having the pictures will help."

"Also got another sightin' of her at the Crescent's lounge. Some girls there IDed her from the photos. Seems she has a friend named Raven—but neither's been around for a while."

"Friend a hooker, too?"

Jake nodded. "Seems so."

The corners of Tony's mouth edged slightly upward. "You going to tell me why finding this girl is so important to you?"

'Told you the other night. Her sister's worried, couldn't get any assistance through conventional routes, and I'm just tryin' to help."

Tony's expression spread into a cautious, accusatory smile. "And you still want to claim there's nothing romantic going on between you and this pretty Stephanie?"

"Yep." Short. Simple. And true.

Because it had to be true. Nothing else made sense for him—at least not yet. And as for what he felt when he was with her... he couldn't decipher that, but he couldn't deal with the reality of it, either, so he was just going to push it aside. God knew he had experience at pushing down his emotions. This should be simple. And it should start right now. From this moment on, screw the dreams and whatever they might mean—from this moment on, she was a pretty woman and he was a hungry guy, and that was all there was to their attraction. Hot sex. Nothing else.

Even if his blood was itching with wanting to see her again, even now.

Rain raked in sheets across the empty courtyard and Shondra hugged Scruff tight, despite the smell of his wet fur, which was really no worse than the wet mattress she sat on. Her jeans were soaked. Her hair too. No matter how hard she leaned into the old concrete foundation, she and Scruff still got wet.

The dog whimpered, so she scratched behind his ears. "I know it blows, but this is the best we got tonight."

That's when she remembered the po'boy. She hadn't gone to the Café Du Monde for beignets today, or shared lunch with Jake as usual—in fact, she'd been sitting around wondering just where the hell he was when he'd come strolling into the courtyard with a brown paper bag in his hand. "Ate lunch out today, 'tite fille, but got you some."

"Thanks," she'd said softly, unable to meet his eyes when she took the bag. There was something different about him bringing her food—maybe running the errand every day made her feel like she was earning it, like it wasn't pure charity. Today was pure charity, but she'd taken it anyway. She had her pride, but sometimes hunger won out and her stomach had gotten too used to being filled since she'd met Jake.

"Why the frown? You like a nice roast beef po'boy, no? Got fries, too."

The food sounded so good that her stomach had nearly jumped for joy. "Thanks," she'd said again, less timidly this time. "A lot."

She'd shared the thick potato wedges with Scruff, scarfing them down quick, then ate half the sandwich and decided to save the rest for later. Now seemed like a good time for something that would cheer them both up, so she reached for her backpack and unwrapped what remained of the po'boy. She pinched off a bite of roast beef and gravy-soaked French bread for Scruff—who'd learned to be real patient once he'd understood she always shared— before taking a big bite herself.

A few minutes later, though, the food was gone and the rain still fell, and even when it didn't slant up under the gallery, her skin stayed just as clammy. She held out the wrapper to let Scruff lick it clean, then wadded it into a ball, wishing she'd been smart enough to bring a wind-breaker when she'd run away.

If I had it to do over again...

Would she have stayed? Nope. It made her skin crawl just to think about it.

If I had it to do over again, I'd pack better.

And I'd find a way to get some money off that bastard.

When a door closed somewhere in the courtyard, she flinched, pulling her shoes up under her, trying to make herself as small as possible. Nobody had ever bothered her here, but she still liked being as invisible as she could, especially at night.

So it was all she could do not to panic when the shape of a man came jogging toward her across the courtyard, ducking under the overhang directly in front of her.

She only breathed again when she saw it was Jake.

" You tryin ' to scare the shit outta me ? "

He only laughed. "Always good to see you, too, 'tite filler-She swallowed sheepishly, sorry for biting his head off. "What do you want?"

'Thinkin' maybe you oughta come inside."

"Huh?"

He glanced toward the rain pouring a few feet away, then to the mattress she rested on. "Your bed's soaked. So are you."

She stayed quiet, searching for a reply and wondering if she looked nervous. She wasn't afraid of Jake that way anymore, she really wasn't. Still... old worries tightened her chest.

Finally, he sighed. "It's a dry place to sleep. You want it, take it. I'm goin' back in now."

Just as he started back out into the rain, she said, "Can I bring Scruff?"

He took a step back, dropping a disdainful gaze to the dog before finally rolling his eyes. "Fine. Follow me."

Looping her backpack over one shoulder, she gathered the dog in her arms and scuttled across the uneven brickwork behind Jake until they were under cover again, then followed him up the stairs she'd seen him come down so many times. She didn't put Scruff down, even though he weighed a ton, afraid he might do something to make Jake mad before she could get him inside.

She followed Jake into a living room with once-white walls that were now yellowed, the old linoleum on the floor scratched and torn. A sagging couch was strewn with newspaper, the beat-up laminate coffee table laden with a basket of laundry and an array of empty cans.

"But that mutt better not piss on the floor," he said, pointing to Scruff as she set him down, his claws tapping on the linoleum.

She took another look around. " 'Cause you take such nice care of the place?"

Jake just looked at her for a long, hard moment—then laughed. The rich sound of it reverberated through the space until he finally said, "Mon Dieu, you're a funny kid. I keep forgettin' that."

Feeling tighter inside now, she pointed to the broken-down couch. "This mine?"

He nodded. "Just shove the newspaper on the floor."

"Or I could put it in the garbage." A glance revealed it was from last week. "You do got a garbage can, don't ya?"

"Yes, I have a garbage can," he replied with a hint of sarcasm. "By the kitchen counter."

As she wadded the newspaper, her eyes stuck on a framed picture on the end table. A pretty white woman, dark brown wavy hair, tight freckling across her nose. Her arms were crossed, sunglasses pushed up over her head. Colored beads hung around her neck 'This your girlfriend?"

He stuck his head around the corner from the kitchen to look, his eyes clouding over a little. "No."

"Who then?" she asked as he disappeared back through the doorway. "My wife."

Whoa! "You're married?" She walked to the end of the couch and peered through the wide, arched opening to see him closing up a heaping garbage bag.

He glanced up at her briefly before looking back to his task. "Not anymore. She died."

It felt like all the blood drained into her feet. He wasn't old enough to have a wife who'd died. It explained ... a lot. "I'm sorry," she said softly.

He plunked the full bag against an ancient refrigerator, cans and bottles rattling inside, and still didn't look at her. "Don't gotta be sorry. Everybody dies sometime."

She just nodded, even though he wasn't watching, and took a seat on the couch. Scruff jumped up beside her and she shoved him back to the floor, knowing Jake wouldn't want wet doggy paws on his couch, no matter how saggy it was.

Good thing too, because he came back in just then and sat down at the opposite end. Scruff stood at her feet, tongue lolling over one side of his open mouth, and she pressed on his furry back until he melted toward the floor to he across the toes of her tennis shoes.

"I'm thinkin' maybe me and you need to talk," Jake said. He stretched one muscular arm across the back of the couch, the sleeve of his dark blue T-shirt stretching taut on his forearm.

She lifted her gaze. "What you wanna talk about?"

"Where'd you run away from, Shondra?"

The use of her name stunned her—he'd never called her by it before. But she still stayed quiet.

"Here in the city, somewhere outside town, somewhere different altogether?"

When she finally spoke, her voice came out meek. "I ain't sayin'." "Why?"

She took a deep breath, let it back out. " 'Cause you'll try to make me go back there, and I ain't goin'."

"What was so bad for you to run away?"

"Told you. Just couldn't deal."

He tilted his head. "What's that mean?"

Her stomach clenched, just like always when she thought about why she'd left. She'd tried to tell before. Tried to tell Grandma Maisy once. And tried to tell her best friend, Donya, at a sleepover. But each time, her throat seemed to close in on itself.

Despite all this, though ... to her surprise she found herself slowly beginning to tell Jake. Maybe just to see if she could. "My father left a couple years back."

Jake's brown eyes narrowed. "That's rough."

She instantly went defensive, maybe because his reply sounded so clichéd. "What would you know about it bein' rough?"

"My dad left my mom and me, too. When I was twelve."

Her ire died, her stomach settling a little. "Oh. I was fourteen when mine took off." She looked away, down at her knees, before lifting her gaze again. "You miss him?"

"I missed the hell out of him. Kept thinkin' he'd come back—for years."

"Did he ever?"

He hesitated, then shook his head. "Nope. Still gone."

She swallowed and tried not to let it kill her hope that her father would come back. Not that she'd know, of course, not being at home anymore. She'd never thought about that before—about having no way to know if he ever came home himself.

"Anyway," she went on, "my mama hooked up with some white dude." She flinched slightly at her own words and added, "No offense."

He cast a soft smile. "None taken."

"They can't get married 'cause Daddy ain't been gone long enough, but he lives with us, same as if everything we got is his more than it's ours. He thinks he's all that, and he's always ..." She glanced down, stomach churning again. "He's always ... botherin' me."

"Botherin' you how?"

The heat of the obvious answer suffused her face, making her look away, back to her blue jeans. She reached out to fiddle with the hole just above her right knee, pulling lightly at the thick, frayed thread.

She hadn't actually gotten much more out than she had with her grandma and Donya, but she somehow knew he heard her; he understood.

"I'm sorry," he said, his deep voice more comforting than she'd ever heard it before. "I won't make you tell me any more."

"It's cool," she lied with a shrug, even though she still played with the threads of denim, running her fingers over them again and again. "It's just... whack, you know?"

"I know," he said. But he thought she was putting it lightly. His stomach was tied in knots and he only wished she'd tell him where the guy lived, so he could go rip him a new asshole. Maybe the mother, too. Peter, Paul, and Mary. No wonder she'd been so nervous around him in the beginning.

And damn, she was . . . what? Sixteen? He'd never have guessed her a day over fourteen and was glad he hadn't known as it would've made him even more hesitant to have anything to do with her, let alone invite her into his apartment. Merde, if anyone found out about this, he'd look like the kind of guy Shondra's mom had hooked up with.

To break the awkward moment, he said, "You want somethin' to eat?"

She nodded enthusiastically, and as he pushed up from the couch, he pretended he didn't see her wiping a tear away as she bent over to the scroungy dog.

He headed into the kitchen and checked the fridge. Beer, margarine, ketchup, and the last of a fruit salad Tony had forced on him a week ago. Turning to open an overhead cabinet, he found a box of Rice-A-Roni and some Pop-Tarts.

"You keep a well-stocked kitchen, don't ya?" she asked from behind.

He turned on her with a sarcastic smile before leaning back against the counter to cross his arms. "How about pizza?" It was late—he'd gotten home from Sophia's just a little while ago—but he hadn't eaten dinner, so it sounded good to him, too.

Her eyes lit up. "For real? You mean it?"

He'd had no idea pizza would excite her so much. "Yeah, sure."

"Can we get extra cheese?"

"Whatever you want."

She looked down at the dog, now sitting at their feet, staring up at them. "Hear that, Scruff? We're havin' pizza!"

He thought about saying the dog was not eating their pizza, but hell—let the mutt eat. Still, he arched one eyebrow. "Just don't let him make a mess with it."

She glanced around the kitchen. "Because you keep—"

"I know, I know—such a nice place. You're a smartass, you know."

She smiled. "Yeah. But you like me."

"Tony might have a lead on Raven," Jake had said to her over the phone a few hours ago. "I'm meetin' him at a bar on Bourbon at midnight, after work—place called LaVeau's. Thought you might want to join us."

"Of course," she'd replied, wondering if her enthusiasm was more about getting one step closer to Tina or just about seeing Jake. Ribbons of anticipation had curled through her at the mere thought.

Now Stephanie traveled Royal Street by taxi, her heart beating harder than it probably should. Especially given that she'd spent ah day yesterday and most of today being a good little executive soldier, giving Rod Hartman his reassurance call, catching up with her other team members by e-mail and phone, and working on the pitch for the wireless company. Basically, she'd told herself, she was getting her priorities straight. One night of sex didn't mean she didn't have to care about her job, her future. All it meant was that she was a normal, red-blooded woman and Jake was a normal—okay, hotter than normal—red-blooded guy and they were having an affair.

God, she thought as she exited the cab on Toulouse, a block from Bourbon, / hope it's an affair. She hoped he would want her again ... and again ... and again. And upon recalling that kiss at her door yesterday morning, she decided she had nothing to worry about. It was an affair. There was more to come.

When she returned to Chicago, she planned to let Curtis down gently. Now that she understood how she was supposed to feel with a man, she knew she shouldn't waste her time with guys she experienced no real connection with. She should move on to the men who did thrill her. At the moment, she couldn't imagine being as turned on by anyone as she was by Jake, but wasn't passion always like that? She'd known little of it, but had to assume that was the case.

And another thing, she'd decided. No more sappy Unes like / wish I could ride back with you. No matter how gentle and patient he'd been, she instinctively knew a man like Jake wasn't looking for a relationship. This would end when they located Tina. And that was okay.

Even if her stomach churned at the prospect.

Okay, so maybe she was feeling some tender emotions about the guy, but that was natural, given the sexual freedom he'd helped her find the other night. Not a problem, she promised herself. This was just an affair.

Her first, she thought with just a hint of I'm-a-liberated-twenty-first-century-woman pride. Her first real this-is-all-about-me affair. Jason didn't count, because that had been first love, and it had only happened once. And none of the other men she'd slept with counted, either, because there'd been no true passion involved. So as she reached the Bourbon Street party district, she experienced a pleasant little tingle between her thighs that came with the thought I'm going to meet my lover. Her first real, true, bona fide lover.

Darkness had fallen hours earlier and crowds of people moved up and down the small street, in and out of bars, restaurants, and open-air souvenir shops. On all sides of her, Stephanie sensed the night coming alive—people stood in clusters talking and drinking every colorful concoction imaginable. As she'd noticed the last time she'd been on Bourbon at night, some wore Mardi Gras beads.

Bars of every kind beckoned to passersby—offering jazz, karaoke, hurricanes, and sex, sex, sex. As she passed by the Playpen, she couldn't help revisiting her conflicted emotions on the night she and Jake had gone inside. Revulsion and ... passion—with Jake. She shifted her glance to the storefront across the way where he'd kissed her senseless.

By the time she found LaVeau's, situated in a typical French Quarter brick facade, she was burning to see Jake. And praying she hadn't imagined his ardor at the door yesterday.

Music echoed through the open entryway, a song sung in Cajun French. Inside, she found a small dance club, generic except for the decor: Mardi Gras masks of every shape, color, and material wallpapered the place. That one aspect somehow turned LaVeau's lush and mysterious in a way that seemed to reach out and grab her as she worked her way through the people gathered at the bar.

"Stephanie."

At the rich, deep sound of Jake's voice, her heart nearly stopped. She turned to find him sitting with Tony at a small table near the back. As she moved toward them, her stomach felt as fluttery as when he kissed her.

When their eyes met, his hot gaze instantly transported her away from the music and the people, back to the little house on the bayou where he'd shown her sex was nothing to fear, but something to be reveled in, so long as you had the right person to revel with.

That quickly, though, she nearly gulped back the thought. The right person, she quickly amended, meaning only someone who truly excited you and... someone you trusted. Somewhere along the way she'd truly started trusting Jake, in so many ways.

"Find the place okay?" he asked as she took a chair next to him.

"Yeah, no problem," she said over the music.

Tony leaned slightly across the table. "I'm meeting a date here in a little while, as soon as she gets off work at a restaurant around the corner. If I'd known Jake was inviting you, I'd have chosen someplace quieter."

She smiled. "It's fine—I like it here. Seems fun."

Although, admittedly, on the inside, what she really liked here was the sexy man seated next to her. His muscled arms extended from one of his usual well-fitted dark-colored tees, the bottom half of St. Michael peeking from beneath the sleeve. His ebony hair lay just slightly over the shirt's neckband in back and a few locks drooped across his forehead. His eyes looked sinfully warm tonight, and when his knee touched hers beneath the table, his smile seemed laced with still more of that sweet, hot sin.

"So, about your sister's friend Raven," Tony said.

She blinked, shifting her gaze from Jake to Tony, drawn from her sensual preoccupation. "Yes?"

"I did some asking around and found out she bounces around a lot, but seems to work mostly in the CBD."

"CBD?"

"Sorry," Tony said. "Forgot you aren't from around here. The Central Business District—across Canal Street. A lot of big hotels that host conventions, tall office buildings, and a casino—the girls there work the big spenders from out of town, plus the locals that hang out at the few seamier places tucked between the high-rises."

She nodded.

"The Crescent is in the CBD," Jake pointed out.

"I figure Jake and I can hit some of the hotter spots in the area," Tony continued, "ask about both Raven and your sister, show your sister's picture to some bartenders, that sort of thing. It's not much, but it's something."

Fresh hope bloomed in Stephanie's heart. "It's a step in the right direction, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate it."

Tony shrugged. "Just my job, really."

Yet she shook her head. "It's a lot more than I got going through the official routes. And it sounds like a substantial lead to me—at least a lot more places to look."

Jake slipped an arm around the back of her chair, leaning in close. "But you'll be a good little girl and stay put and wait to hear from me, no?"

She thought of arguing that three people could cover the area easier than two, but thought better of it, given how many times they'd been down this particular road. So she simply pursed her lips and nodded, feeling almost contrite.

At Tony's puzzled look, Jake explained, "Miss Stephanie here likes to play PI, but I'm helpin' her only on the condition she take that particular job title off her résumé."

She couldn't resist rolling her eyes, a little embarrassed in front of Tony. "He exaggerates. I was just trying to help."

"Gettin' yourself in trouble is what you were doin' and you know it."

She flashed Jake a chiding look, so he returned it. But along with his annoyance he experienced a healthy dose of want, and even as he narrowed his eyes on her in derision, he remained fully aware of the points on his body that touched her. His hand, resting atop the back of her chair, edging into her shoulder. His knee, pressed firmly to hers beneath the table. Frissons of electricity radiated through his body from those two little spots.

As usual, she looked gorgeous. Tonight she wore a formfitting, stretchy little blouse of lavender above a pretty flowered skirt that stopped a few inches above her knee. Her blond hair fell straighter than usual, tucked back behind her ears, showing off beaded earrings that matched the bracelet circling her slender wrist.

"Can I get you a drink?"

They all looked up to see the same twenty-something brunette who'd already brought him and Tony tall glasses of beer. He watched Stephanie tilt her head, considering. "I'll have a sea breeze."

He couldn't help chuckling.

She noticed and said, "What?"

"Nothin'," he replied as the waitress walked away. "Guess I just get a kick out of hearin' what you order. Never the same thing twice."

She shrugged. "They say variety's the spice of life."

He allowed a soft grin to sneak out. "I like a woman who's a little unpredictable."

"And I qualify?"

He nodded shortly. "You never stop surprisin' me, in fact."

She returned his smile and he supposed she knew he was thinking about the other night, about the sex they'd had right after they'd agreed not to have sex, the way she'd so warmly sheathed him with her body just when he'd finally accepted the fact that it wasn't gonna happen. The hottest surprise he'd ever received, by far.

As a Zachary Richard ballad came to a close, a more lively tune took its place. "Dance with me," she said.

"Huh?" he asked, then shook his head. "I don't really dance, beb."

"Neither do I." "Then why ..."

"Because you like a woman who's a Utile unpredictable."

She pushed to her feet and took his hands in hers, and the last thing he heard before he let her pull him onto the dance floor was Tony, whose presence he'd almost forgotten, saying, "Nothing romantic, my ass."

No, Jake didn't dance, but there he suddenly was, in the center of a small but crowded dance floor, moving to an easy, bluesy beat with Stephanie Grant. She smiled up at him as they both found the rhythm without too much trouble; she still held both his hands. His heart felt lighter than it had in... God, he couldn't even measure how long, and he didn't really want to, either. He just wanted to be in the moment with her—no past, no future, nothing but this.

He soon found himself stepping up closer, resting his palms on her hips, swaying to the music, pelvis to pelvis, as she circled his neck with her arms. Through the speakers, he heard Los Lonely Boys wondering how far it was to heaven, and he couldn't help thinking she made it seem pretty damn close sometimes.

Before the song ended, their legs had become intertwined, creating perfect friction as they moved together, and his hands eased farther down, onto her ass. He couldn't help drawing her even closer as she smiled up into his eyes to say, "Is this what they call dirty dancing?"

He chuckled, squeezing her rear tightly. "If it's not, it oughta be."

When she slowly ran her tongue over her upper lip, he watched it grow slick and shiny, then took the invitation to lower a slow kiss to her pretty mouth. He skimmed one hand to the small of her back, wanting to feel every contour of her body against his.

"Missed you, beb." He heard the words leave him, as unplanned as the low rasp in his voice.

"I missed you, too," she purred, her face close, her hips still swaying sexily against his.

"Wanna get outta here?"

Her eyes sparkled with heat. "Your place or mine?" "Yours."

She laughed. "That was decisive." "Well," he began uncertainly, "there's ... sort of a sixteen-year-old girl at my place."

Her face dropped as she went stiff in his arms—and he realized exactly how bad that sounded. He drew her closer, eager to reassure her. "A runaway," he explained. "She was havin' a rough time with her mom's boyfriend, so she took off. I found her on the street one night—same night I met you, in fact. I've been helpin' her get by, makin' sure she has somethin' to eat every day, and last night when it was rainin' so hard, I let her sleep on my couch. I tried to talk her into goin' to a homeless shelter or a runaway center, but she wants nothin' to do with it—and I just don't have the heart to put her back out now that I've invited her in."

He couldn't read the look on Stephanie's face, had no idea what she might be thinking of him, but barreled ahead with a thought that had hit him earlier in the evening when he'd been watching Shondra standing at his ink, washing the latest pile of dirty dishes to accumulate here. "In fact, I was thinkin' maybe you could help me with somethin'. I wanna buy her some new clothes. As kind of a surprise—since sometimes she seems to have trouble takin' a straight handout, so I doubt she'd just let me take her shopping'. She mentioned maybe tryin' to get a job, somethin' to get her on the road to bein' able to take care of herself, only right now she's in holey blue jeans and—"

Without warning, Stephanie pulled him down into another kiss, this one firm and sharp and needful.

After, he dared a small grin. "Is that a yes?"

She nodded. "You are... the sweetest man, do you know that?"

He laughed uncomfortably, looking away. Then he caught sight of Tony, chin perched on a fist, studying them with a gleam in his eye, so he turned back to her. "Isn't about bein' sweet, chère. Just didn't think I could live with myself if I left her on the street."

Her smile widened as her gaze turned piercing and sexy. "Let's get out of here."

He raised teasing eyebrows. "In a hurry?"

She nodded profusely. "I want to reward you. Want to show you just how sweet I think you are. Unless, of course, you still insist you're not sweet."

He grinned. "Okay, on second thought, maybe I am sweet. Maybe I'm the sweetest damn guy you ever met."

Curling his hand into Stephanie's, he led her off the dance floor and back to the table. She grabbed her purse from her chair as he said to Tony, "We're takin' off."

Tony only grinned as he pointed toward the tropical-looking sea breeze and Jake's nearly full glass of beer. "Don't want your drinks?"

Jake yanked his wallet out and dropped a twenty on the table, no longer trying to hide his ardor for the woman at his side. "Not thirsty anymore, pard," he said with a quick wink.

As he took her hand again and whisked her from LaVeau's out onto Bourbon, he heard music blaring from every door, people laughing, and saw scantily clad strippers tossing beads from a balcony to hungry-eyed guys below. But he didn't give a damn about any of that as he led her through the crowd, making a beeline for the nearest open thoroughfare where they could get a taxi. The only party he wanted to have tonight was with the beautiful, unpredictable, sexy blonde whose kisses made him tremble inside.

Heat ascended his spine as he endured the short cab ride to LaRue House. They sat close, thighs pressed together, his fingers caressing her inner knee. She was peering up at him in the near darkness, saying how nice it was for Tony to help them out and how she felt in her heart that Raven would lead them to Tina. And he was peering down at her, thinking how soft her lips looked, and how warm and wonderful she was, and thinking, / want you, beb. Mon Dieu, how I want you.

Finally, he leaned to whisper warmly in her ear, "I'm afraid I can't hear a word you're sayin', chère."

She blinked up at him. "Why not?"

Still gazing into those pretty eyes—midnight blue beneath the dim, passing streetlights—he reached for her hand and pressed it flat over his raging hard-on.

She sucked in her breath, her gaze going wide with shock—and longing.

She bit her lip, then squeezed lightly. He had to shut his eyes against the pleasure, lest he moan and inform the cabdriver something was going on in the backseat.

"Feel good?" she whispered near his ear. Her breath tickled.

He could only nod, forcing his eyes back open. Her face was so close he couldn't resist a short, firm kiss. "Wanna kiss you everywhere," he murmured.

"See how sweet you are?" she said in a playful tone.

"Sweet doesn't describe what I'm gonna do to you once we get in that room, beb."

She gave her lower lip another sensual nibble and looked ready to let him keep that promise.

"LaRue House," the elderly cabbie said, announcing their arrival.

Jake hurried to pay, then grabbed her hand. She led the way down the dark walk with him following close behind. While the other night he'd been willing to be patient and go slow for her, tonight it was all he could do to make it to the damn door.

As she dug for her keys, his hands found her hips and he leaned into her from behind. He kissed her neck and pressed his erection warm against her until she moaned softly, her keys dropping to the brick walk with a jangle. Instead of stooping for them, though, she turned into his arms, her eyes wild. Impulse led his palms to her rear until he was picking her up, nailing her to the locked door with his body, until her legs wrapped tight around him, small heels gouging at his butt.

They kissed feverishly, like long-parted lovers, and he couldn't get enough of her mouth, her soft skin, the kisses soon grown short and frantic to match their rhythm below.

"Put me down," she said, breathless. "We have to get in the room."

His own voice came just as choppy and labored. "Why not do it right here?"

She shook her head, still panting, and managed a small smile. "Because I like this place, and I don't want Mrs. Lindman to kick me out."

He looked around the quiet garden area. "Nobody here but me and you."

"Inside," she purred, but he liked that she didn't seem to have the strength to disengage from him on her own, that her legs remained folded firm around him.

He was more than a little tempted to reach for his zipper, but feared he'd drop her if he let go. He growled with frustration, lowering her to the ground, where she hurriedly scooped up her keys. She jammed one in the door, twisting the knob until it came open, both of them nearly falling through.

Once shut inside, Jake took the purse from her hand and tossed it on a desk as he backed her against the dresser, pure instinct driving his every move. Had he ever needed sex as badly as he needed it with this woman? Had he ever truly experienced this can't-make-it-to-the-bed feeling?

"Do you have any idea how beautiful you are, chèreV His hands curved over her full breasts, then down the slender arc of her waist.

She went still in his grasp, looking up at him as if he'd just said something amazing. "No," she said, her voice soft and low. "Or... not before you anyway. No man has ever made me feel that the way you do."

It was true, Stephanie realized with a hint of shock. No one had ever looked at her like Jake did. Even if it meant nothing, was no more than lust—the affair she'd acknowledged on the way to meet him tonight—he gazed at her as if she were the most exquisite woman ever born, as if he needed her more than he needed air to breathe, as if he would climb any mountain for her or cross any desert. Maybe that was why she'd been able to open her body to him.

"Turn around," he whispered.

Somehow things had slowed. The same intense desire still swam through her veins, yet their words had placed a gentle hush over the passion.

As he guided her to face the cheval mirror in the corner of the room, he softly whispered, "I want you to see. Want you to see just exactly how beautiful you are."

Their eyes met in the glass, the small lamp she'd left on providing just enough illumination that she could study them both in shadow.

"Look at this perfect body," he murmured as she watched his splayed fingers roaming her—hips, stomach, breasts, thighs. "Look at how lovely you are from the top of your head to the tips of your toes."

Stephanie stayed quiet, absorbing his words. Before that quiet moment in time, she would have said her forehead was a little too wide, her breasts a bit saggy, and her thighs far too flabby. She would have wished for a better complexion, to have higher cheekbones, thicker hair. But as she looked at herself through Jake's eyes, as she heard the genuine sincerity in his voice, she swallowed back all those old, vague wishes and felt as if she were exactly what he'd said: perfect.

"Thank you," she whispered.

"For what?" His big hands still slowly explored, one stretched across her stomach, the other pulling aside the collar of her blouse so he could lower a kiss to her shoulder.

"Making me see it. Feel it."

"That you're perfect?"

She nodded in the mirror.

"I just thought you should know. Thought you should see what / see when I look at you."

Leaning her head to one side to accept more of his spine-tingling kisses, she watched in the mirror, studying the sensual sight they created. Her inner thighs ached for more and she almost wished she'd let him make love to her outside, against the door. But she hadn't wanted to rush—there was so much she wanted to do tonight, so much inside her ready to burst free. She wasn't even sure exactly what lurked in there—only that she sensed she was on the verge of finding out. At the bayou house, she had learned to trust, to give her body over to him. Tonight, she wanted to go much further—she wanted to give up control, she wanted to take all control, she wanted to indulge her darkest desires.

Jake's grazing touches grew more demanding, his erection pressed into her from behind as he nipped at her earlobe to send vibrations of heat skittering inward. "Remember how patient I was the other night?" he whispered hotly, their gazes meeting in the mirror.

Both his hands closed firm over her breasts and she lifted her own hands to cover them, pressing his palms hard against her. "Mmm, yes."

"And you'd have to agree that these last few minutes, after what almost happened against the door, I've shown commendable restraint, too—no?"

She laughed softly, even as he lowered a kiss to her temple. "Yes. Definitely."

His face rested directly next to hers in the mirror, his eyes brimming with quiet insistence. "Well, beb, that's all gone. I'm afraid you've taken all I had, and I don't have one more ounce of patience to give you."

Her breath caught, wondering what it would be like when he wasn't patient and she wasn't saying no. When both of them were giving, and taking, and needing, and demanding. And from somewhere deep inside her, one word rose: "Please."

"What?"

"Please. Everything. Now."

"Mon Dieu," he breathed, then grazed his teeth down her earlobe to leave her trembling. Because she was giving it all to him, all control. Because she trusted him that much.

Their gazes met in the mirror as his fingers closed around the placket on her blouse—both hands yanked and the stretchy shirt burst open. She gasped, stunned at the sight of her blouse hanging askew, her breasts rising from the cups of her lacy lavender bra.

He began to knead one aching breast, and as she bit her Up at the pleasure, he skimmed his other hand up her inner thigh, under her skirt, until his fingers stroked between her legs. He caressed her over her lace panties as his fingers dug in the cup of her bra. "I wanna touch you 'til you come," he growled, soft and low. "I wanna watch you feel it."

She pulled in her breath as his fingertips edged beneath the elastic at her inner thigh, his touch coming flesh to flesh, sinking deep into her folds. She bit her Up and heard her own moan leak free.

"Open your eyes, beb."

She hadn't even realized she'd closed them, but on his command she eased them open and the erotic sight before her urged her to move against his hand. Her breasts had been freed from her bra, and with his other palm he caressed and molded, gently pinching the pink tip between two fingers.

She'd never seen herself in such sexual disarray— never known desire so raw and fierce. "So pretty," he murmured. And though she'd never imagined such half-dressed abandon could be pretty, she saw it—what he saw. She loved his ability to view things so honestly, to make this rough, urgent sex so perfectly lovely. Not like at the Playpen, where raw and blatant had meant revulsion to her. Not like the unpleasant act she was forced to envision between her parents. Up to now, sex had fit only into two categories in her mind: blatant and ugly, or more refined but mundane. This—she and Jake in the mirror— was something new. Raw, and real, and good.

"You make me pretty," she murmured on a hot rush of breath.

She caught his sensual smile in the glass and knew he understood what she meant—that this unrefined sexual version of herself was as much a product of him as her. The two of them, together, made her this way.

His hand curved soft and gentle around her breast as his touches below grew quicker, harder, driving her closer to ecstasy. She felt herself reaching, reaching, working her way toward that promised release, his fingers seeming to know exactly what she needed at every step of the journey. In their reflection, his eyes never left her—he studied her as if she were some rare work of art, some erotic statue in a park. And it was his gaze as much as his fingers that had her panting, writhing, stretching—then dropping, dropping, plunging in a wild free fall through time and space and pleasure, her hot, high sighs echoing through the room as every limb of her body went weightless and tingly.

She nearly collapsed when it was over, except that he was holding her up, one arm looped firm around her waist.

The second she got her strength back, she spun in his grasp, lifted her hands to his stubbled cheeks, and pulled him into a kiss. Nothing gentle or warm—more like when he'd ripped her blouse open. She needed to feel his lips, his teeth, his tongue. She needed to feel his strength— nothing held back.

As they exchanged hard kisses, she jerked at his T-shirt, and he helped, stopping the connection of their mouths only long enough to yank it off over his head.

She reached for his belt and he assisted with that, too, not quite getting his jeans open before pulling her onto the bed with him, crossways, him beneath her. There the struggle re-ensued, leaving Stephanie so lost in the rough heat of pure passion that she couldn't make decisions. Undress him or kiss him? Kiss him or explore him?

She rained kisses down his darkly dusted chest, her hands shifting frantically between the breadth of his shoulders and the zipper at his crotch. He seemed to wrestle the same problem, his hands tangling in her skirt one moment, moving up to mold her breasts the next. Soft, teasing kisses cooled her nipples beneath the slow turn of the ceiling fan as he rolled her to her back. Then the kisses became little bites that made her cry out. The sensation pulsed between her thighs just as keenly as at her breasts, and despite her orgasm, she desperately needed more.

The next time his hands pushed their way up under the jumbled skirt, his fingers curled around the lace edge of her matching lavender panties, and his kisses skimmed downward, over her stomach, past the fabric bunched at her hips.

"Pretty panties, chère," he breathed, and their eyes met roughly over her breasts as he ripped the lace above one thigh. It dropped freely from her hip.

"You're hell on my underwear," she managed through ragged breaths.

"They keep gettin' in my way."

"I don't mind," she admitted. She'd never imagined something so urgent could please her. "It gets me hot."

He hovered above, peering darkly down at her. "Mmm, show me how hot you are, beb"

Stephanie bit her lip, stared up into those sexy brown eyes that had all but paralyzed her the first time she'd ever seen them, then found the courage to truly do what he asked, to turn loose all her inhibitions.

Planting her palms on his chest, she rolled them both until he lay flat on his back, her on top. Lifting one knee over his hips, she towered above him as she reached to the panties still curving over one hip. Grabbing onto the swatch of lace, she followed his lead and ripped it further apart so that the tattered undoes dropped away completely.

Next she went back to work on his blue jeans, lowering the zipper, spreading the denim wide, and freeing him from black cotton underwear. She trembled, looking down, and when she ran the flat of her hand over the hard ridge, he shuddered, too, and it raced through her like electricity. Who'd have ever thought that she, Stephanie Grant, would have power over a man like Jake Broussard? The very knowledge was exhilarating, and she bit her lower hp to quell the sensations crashing through her.

It didn't work, of course, and she didn't really want it to.

She wanted to thrill him. She wanted to thrill herself as well.

Easing her way up his body, she bathed his erection in her sex, raking slowly over his hardness to make them both gasp.

She leaned, lowering one breast to his waiting mouth as she continued moving against him, and she thought she could come that way—that fast, again—but she wanted more, more of that intoxicating power he was granting her. A whole different kind of control than she'd ever known—control that came from the very loss of control. So even as excruciating as it was to leave such intense pleasure behind, she rose higher, moved her knees up farther, past his shoulders, until that most sensitive part of her hovered over his mouth.

"Mon Dieu, chère," he growled, his warm breath assaulting her inner thighs as his hands curled like gentle vises over her rear.

A hot, trembling cry left her at the impact of his tongue. After that, all thought was gone—nothing remained but the heated circles she moved in and the selfless pleasure he delivered. The limpness of her limbs, the heat of his mouth. The raging sensations, climbing higher and higher, like flames inside her... until she combusted. The pulse of pure pleasure forced her to abandon her senses for a long, smoldering moment, until finally she collapsed next to him on the bed in complete exhaustion.

Jake, however, clearly was not so exhausted, and when he rolled onto her—and into her, easily—she cried out at the joy of being filled with him. He murmured in French as he moved inside her, delivering hot tongue kisses between his sexy whispers.

"You feel so good in me," she heard herself utter. "So good in me."

His eyes, shut in passion, opened on her, looking like she'd just given him a gift, and she knew her words meant more than if they'd come from any other woman, because having a man feel truly good inside her was such a new thing. He 'd given her the gift.

"I don't think I can hold back, beb. Too excited by you."

"Come in me. I want you to."

The long, hot groan escaped him almost instantly as he pressed her to the bed with one deep stroke. Her arms folded around his shoulders as his breath warmed her ear.

And when his pleasure eased and she opened her eyes, she tried to think of something to say to express her emotions or capture the moment, something clever or witty or sexy that might make him remember this for a very long time—but his expression told her she didn't have to say a thing. Just the connection of their eyes was enough.

Jake lay in her bed, looking around a room that, by all rights, should make him a little uncomfortable—fine antiques, expensive fabrics, Old South luxury. Yet he'd never felt so relaxed in his life, or at least not for a very long time.

The rectangular shaft of tight shining from the half-shut bathroom door made him hope she'd be back next to him soon. He let out a sigh at the memory of Stephanie being so aggressive, so wild and hungry. So much... like the dream woman.

There wouldn't be any more dreams. Couldn't be. She'd just fulfilled them.

More than just her actions, though—she'd made him feel exactly like he always did in the dreams, too. So much. Too much.

Don't think about that right now. Just don't think about it.

Easier thought than done. He shouldn't want her back in his arms so badly right now. Shouldn't want so desperately to feel her soft nakedness against him under the sheets. Shouldn't hunger so deeply to fall asleep in her arms, to wake up to her smile.

"Miss me?"

He opened his eyes to find her crawling beneath the covers. She pressed warm and sweet against him, nestling in the crook of his arm.

He answered her question with a kiss, then lay back, glad the bathroom light was off and the desk lamp extinguished. He tried to pretend that seeing her only in the shadows somehow lessened his emotions. He tried to let the darkness take him away to someplace else.

"What are you thinking?" she asked.

"That there are angels in the room."

She shifted against him, her hair tickling his chest. "What?"

"You know when you're in a dark room and every now and then you see an odd little spark, a tiny flash that's probably some sort of electricity in the air or the glint off a drawer handle, or maybe even just your eyes playin' tricks on you, but you're never quite sure?"

"Yeah," she said thoughtfully, as if she knew what he meant but maybe hadn't ever thought about it before.

"My manière used to say those little lights were angels in the room, watchin' over us."

"You miss her," she whispered.

He continued watching for the flashes of angels, thinking of his grandmother. "She was my rock. The one thing in the world I could depend on, always. Especially after my dad left. Mamère was strong as a fortress, afraid of nothin'." She was the one person I never had to worry about, knew nothing bad would ever happen to her, never had to take care of her—because she took care of me.

He was glad he'd shut up before uttering that last part. He was growing sleepy, careless. And somewhere along the way, Stephanie had gained the ability to make him talk too much.

"You remind me of her, chère. So strong," he murmured, sleep threatening to swallow him at any moment.

"Me?"

He nodded, despite the darkness, despite that— already—he was talking too much again. "Maybe you don't see it, but you are." Slumber drifted nearer. "And just like her, you're always keepin' me in line, bendin' me to your will. I don't let women push me around too often, but for you ..."

"Yeah?"

"I can't seem to resist."

The room is dark as night, but you stumble toward the prize that awaits you within. You sense her presence—you can almost feel her lush curves in your empty hands. You 're painfully stiff and only she can ease that ache.

You could be in a French Quarter bordello or a Park Avenue high-rise or a country farmhouse—you have no idea where she's drawn you, only that you 'd follow her to the ends of the earth if that's where her path led. You 're in her world now. It's warm there.

Warm, but you 're getting frustrated. "Where are you ? "

Soft arms slip smoothly around you from behind. You don't hear as much as sense her answer. "Right here, lover."

Your head drops back, eyes closing, as she slides one palm down over the bulge in your pants. Mmm, yes.

"Is this what you want? " Her hand molds around you, begins to knead.

"Oui, beb. Oui."

A second later, your clothes are gone and she's kneeling before you. You still can't see her—she's only a slender shadow below—but there's no mistaking the feeling when her mouth slides over your cock. You gasp, can barely breathe. Her soft lips, moist mouth—you feel every nuance so intensely that it's almost as if this is the first time a woman has done this to you. Not so, but nothing has ever felt this good. You sink your hands in her hair, whisper, "Merci, lover. Oui. "

As her ministrations continue, your pleasure rises higher and higher until your eyes are shut and your panting breaths are the only sound.

But when next you open your eyes—there is light! And color! Fields of flowers. A hot sun beaming down from a bluer-than-blue sky.

Then, like the shift of a kaleidoscope, the colors transform, the fields fade away, the flowers grow into tall buildings painted in vibrant hues, towering over you, making you small.

And that quickly, it all shifts again, another turn of the kaleidoscope, and the ocean sparkles aqua in the distance, and seabirds fly past, an impossibly bright white.

You look down on her, but can only see her hair, your fingers still tangling in it.

Yet you need not see her face to understand she can take you anywhere, everywhere, turn your night to day and your darkness to light.

And she can make you come—mon Dieu, can she make you come—because the rough pulses of pleasure strike then, without warning, and you hear your own groans crawling up from deep within, and you know she owns you now. Funny, you 're not a man who likes the idea of being owned, but in this moment it's the best feeling you've ever experienced.

Only when you next look down on her, she's gone. Nothing before you but a pale, sandy beach.

She owns you, but she's left you. You've never felt more alone.

He awoke with a start, then realized she still lay in his arms. A blanket of relief dropped over him.

Damn it, why did he keep having these dreams? What more did his body—or mind—want?

His eyes adjusted to the darkness enough to see the shape of her head on his shoulder. He listened to her breathing. For now, the dream didn't matter—all that mattered was that he wasn't alone, and he was so damn glad. He bent to kiss her forehead and she stirred slightly. So did what lay between his thighs.

"Merde, beb, I want you," he whispered in desperate frustration. He didn't want to want her at this particular moment. Sleep would have been easier for them both, even at the risk of another dream. But he wasn't that strong. Reaching beneath the sheet, he found her hand and gently moved it until it covered him. Mon Dieu, so good.

"Oh Jake," she murmured in sexy half-sleep, then wrapped her fingers sweetly around him. "I want inside you again."

"I want that, too." Her breathy assurance turned him even harder as she slid one bent knee across his thighs until she was poised perfectly for entry, the tip of him easing into her moisture. "You're wet," he whispered.

"Since the moment I met you."

The words drove him up into her sweet warmth and they both moaned at the impact. He thrust hard and deep, forgetting to be careful, forgetting her body might not be quite ready yet for everything he yearned to give her. But by the time he remembered, she was letting out heated, sexy cries and he knew she wanted to feel all of him. "Harder?" he asked.

"Mmm, yes."

She began moving on him in hot, tight circles, soon whimpering, whimpering, then yelling out. Even in the dark, he could see the hot convulsions take her—the sway of her breasts, the arch of her back—and within a few seconds, he was saying, "Me too, beb. Me too."

A minute later, she rolled off him, laughing softly.

He arched an eyebrow. "Somethin' funny, chèreT

"Just thinking I'm being ... awfully loud."

He turned to face her on the pillow, hoping she could see his smile. "I like you loud." He pushed her hair back behind her ear. "Lets me know I'm doin' a good job."

She giggled. "Also lets Mrs. Lindman know you're doing a good job."

"Afraid she'll be jealous?"

"Afraid she'll kick me out."

"Mrs. Lindman got a husband?"

"She's a widow. She's about seventy-five."

"Sounds like we need to find Mrs. Lindman a good man."

They laughed for a moment more, until Jake asked,

"So what's the chance of us gettin' a bite to eat from Mrs. Lindman's kitchen?"

Stephanie shrugged. "She gives her guests keys to the kitchen, so I could probably go find us something."

"What—I can't go?"

"Ahem," she said, propping up on one elbow. "You seem to keep forgetting—if we haven't already alerted Mrs. Lindman to the fact that there's a man in my room, I'd like to keep it that way."

He grinned up at her in the shadows. "Come on, beb, live dangerously."

"I think I have been."

His mind flashed on Miss Stephanie playing high-priced prostitute, and also on Stephanie giving herself over to him out at the bayou house and again tonight. "So why stop now?"

"Good point," she conceded, reaching to a bedside lamp. They both flinched slightly from the light as she said, "Come on."

Jake stepped into his jeans and Stephanie tossed his T-shirt over her head—it hung well down onto her thighs. She led him out to the brick pathway that circled La Rue House, and when she stopped at another door, the word "Kitchen" written in neat script above, he couldn't help wrapping around her from behind. "Pretty dangerous, chère, walkin' around outside late at night with no panties on. What would you do if somebody came up behind you and did this?" He dipped one hand between her legs, his middle finger stroking into her.

She leaned back against him, practically purring. "I guess I'd melt into his arms."

He lowered a kiss to her neck and murmured low in her ear. "What would Mrs. Lindman think if she knew you were such a bad girl?"

She laughed. "She'd probably be as shocked as / am." She extricated herself from his grasp with a sexy grin over her shoulder, then unlocked the door.

"I'm not shocked."

Stepping inside, she turned on an overhead light to reveal a long table and chairs surrounded by cabinetry lining most of the walls. "No?" she asked, turning toward him.

Damn, she looked fine standing there in his T-shirt, her nipples poking at the cotton, her hair tousled. "I saw it in you all along, chère."

She tilted her head, messy locks rambling over one shoulder. "Really?"

"Not that much of a stretch when you think about it. You were pretendin' to be an escort."

"But you saw right through me."

"You were a little too polished, and a little too innocent. But at the same time, I had a feelin' you'd be an animal in bed."

She straightened slightly. "An animal? I'm an animal?"

He grinned. "Don't worry, it's a compliment."

A slow, self-satisfied little smile unfurled on her pretty face. "I know. Although I think it's safe to say you're the first man who's ever accused me of being an animal."

" 'Cause I'm the first man you've been an animal with."

Her expression edged into something more serious, soft, as they stood gazing at each other in Mrs. Landman's breakfast room. Familiar emotions welled in him and he gently reached out for her hand, lifted it to his mouth, and delivered a tender kiss. All was quiet but for her pretty sigh, and his stomach twisted with affection.

Affection that he'd best quit indulging.

Spying a cookie jar in the shape of a cartoonish French chef resting atop a sideboard, he pointed and said, "Um, let's check that out," in order to lighten things back up.

Stephanie nodded, her eyes saying she was making the same effort as she plucked off the chef's hat and peeked inside. "Chocolate chip," she announced with a smile that put him back at ease that quickly.

"Homemade?"

"Mrs. Lindman's specialty."

"I'm sold," he said, and together they collected a plate of cookies before Stephanie disappeared into the next room, returning with two glasses of milk.

As they made their way back to her room, it occurred to Jake that this was one of the first times he'd actually cared very much about something to eat... in a long while. Sure, he went through the motions, ate whatever was handy when his body let him know he was hungry, but only lately had he truly started enjoying food again— beignets, shrimp étouffée, the greasy good po'boy he'd eaten the other day with Tony, the pizza with Shondra, and now his mouth was practically watering for cookies.

They soon sat in Stephanie's bed, sharing them. "I hope Mrs. Lindman doesn't mind crumbs in her bed," he said.

"Why? Are you thinking of kicking me out and inviting her in?" She'd delivered it without missing a beat, face totally straight.

He lifted his gaze. "Anybody ever tell you sometimes you got a wicked sense of humor, Stephanie Grant?"

She shook her head and smiled. "No, actually."

He quirked a grin. "Must be somethin' else I bring out in you."

From there, conversation flowed easily. Jake asked her about little things he found himself wanting to know: what movies she liked, what music she listened to, her favorite flavor of ice cream. Stephanie soon regaled him with stories from her suburban upbringing—tales of slumber parties and hanging out at the mall, and the night she'd walked out the front door to go to her first formal dance only to be caught in an out-of-control lawn sprinkler.

"Shoulda grown up on the bayou, beb." Jake laughed. "No sprinklers there."

After that, they moved on to friends, Stephanie admitting she'd had close friends in high school and college, but had mostly lost touch with them now. She asked Jake how he'd met Tony, and he explained that they met on their first day at the academy and had hit it off fast despite their differences. But then he quieted—just wanting to hear more about her.

For some reason, though, Stephanie's animated smile immediately disappeared to be replaced with a thoughtful stare.

"What?" He shouldn't have asked, of course, and knew it the moment the word left his mouth, but there it was—an invitation to whatever serious thought suddenly swirled in her mind.

"I was just thinking that it feels like you know so much about me, and I still know so little about you."

He swallowed uncomfortably and hoped she didn't see. "You know plenty about me. You know about the bayou house and Manière, you know about my dad leavin', you know things about my mom. Hell, now you even know I'm harborin' a runaway. Fact is, chère, you know more about me than most people." These days anyway. Once upon a time, he'd been an open book—it had only been the last couple of years that he'd changed into someone so quiet and gruff.

"All that's true, but I still don't know the one thing I've wanted to know about you since the night we met. I still don't know why you're not a cop anymore."

He flashed a look of warning. Same look he generally gave Tony during his lectures, his mother during her attempts at comfort. Same look he'd given Stephanie every time she'd ever asked him about this.

But she didn't back down. "Look, I've opened myself up to you in ways I never even knew I could. And I just... want to know what you're flunking about when you get that faraway look in your eye."

Could he tell her? he wondered. Could he get the words out—all of them?

Most people who knew him already knew what had happened, and they also knew not to bring it up. Even so, it was the reason he'd avoided everyone from his past as much as possible the last two years—because he couldn't face it, and dealing with people who knew the whole damning story somehow meant facing it. And he just didn't know how to—still. It was easier to wallow in guilt by himself.

Even his mother and Tony knew better than to ever say it out loud. Both were bold enough to skirt around it, talk about what they thought should happen now, how he should move on—but they never spoke the ugly truth aloud.

And neither did he. Never had. He'd never had a reason to.

Yet Stephanie's gaze bore into him, and again he asked himself: Can I tell her? Can I get through it? Do I dare ? It was a world away from haywire sprinklers.

He swallowed again, this time past the lump that had grown in his throat. He glanced down at the sheets, the crumbs, the little flowers in the checked print, the remaining cookie on the plate in his lap. "I used to be married."

She hesitated, and he supposed that piece of news alone was enough to catch her off guard. Finally, she said, "Really?"

"Her name was Becky."

"Was?" He heard the dread in her voice and thought, Ah, chère, you don't even know the half of it.

"Was," he confirmed, lifting his gaze to hers just briefly. To those blue, blue eyes. But he discovered he couldn't look at them right now, so he lowered his back to the bedcovers, slouching down until his head met the pillow. "She died."

"I'm ... sorry," she murmured, her voice gone soft and pained for him. But how sorry for him would she feel when she found out why Becky had died?

"It was my fault," he said in more of a rush than he meant to. He stared at the white ceiling, wishing the lights were out like earlier, that he could look for angels in the room to distract him from the truth.

"H-how? How was it your fault?"

"I was workin' undercover," he began, thinking, Get through this. Do it quick, then it can be over. "Tryin' to infiltrate a local drug ring. She didn't want me to do it," he remembered aloud, swallowing again past that damn lump blocking up his throat. "Thought it was too dangerous. But I was ... so fearless. Thought I was the king of the fuckin' world or somethin'. I told her I had to do it—it was my job. I thought I was gonna save people, all the people who'd buy the drugs I was gonna get off the street.

"The plan was that I'd pose as a low-level, independent dealer, then get hired on by the organization. Our target was the kingpin, identity unknown, except to his closest associates. The guy goes by a code name—Typhoeus.

"I'd spent a couple months at it and was gettin' somewhere—buildin' trust, movin' up the ladder—when I got pulled out. Tony was workin' the case from the outside and got wind they'd found out I was a cop.

"I was pissed about all the wasted time and effort, but once I was out, we figured that was the end of it. We hadn't gotten Typhoeus, but we'd come at him from another angle sometime down the road.

"Then one night..." His stomach clenched and he felt close to retching, just thinking back to it.

Stephanie reached out to hold his hand, and he took a deep breath and tried to go on. "One night I took Becky out to dinner. We went to Arnaud's, in the Quarter—her favorite place. My idea, my little way of celebratin' that the job was over, celebratin' for her, 'cause it made her so damn happy. And while we were at dinner..." He stopped again, cleared his throat because something was clogging it up even more. "At dinner she told me she was pregnant. We hadn't been tryin', but we hadn't been not tryin', either. Still, it came as a shock. In a good way. A better-than-I-expected way."

Damn it, this was so hard. He closed his eyes against the emotions. Don't feel. Don't feel. He'd been telling himself that for two years, though, and what good did it ever do?

"On the way home, we stopped at a light on Canal Street and another car pulled up beside us ... and by the time I saw the gun, it was too late."

Next to him, Stephanie flinched. "What?"

"Guy shot her," he said, his mouth feeling numb, his mind too. "Was goin' after me, but she got in the way."

"Oh Jake." Stephanie's voice wrenched with a pain he knew all too well. "Oh God, Jake."

"She just looked at me," he said, remembering it like a dream. "And I kept sayin', 'It's gonna be all right, honey, it's gonna be all right,' but there was so much blood, Steph...." He glanced up at her, somehow needing to feel her presence now. "So damn much blood. In my heart, I knew it was useless. I was tryin' to get to my cell phone, callin' 911, at the same time tryin' to cover up her neck—that's where the bullet hit her—tryin' to cover the hole, stop the blood, but it was everywhere."

He let out a shaky sigh. "That's what I remember the most. All that damn blood. Like it could soak the entire world. And her eyes were so panicky—she knew she was dyin', but I just kept lyin' to her, and I guess I was tryin' to lie to myself, too. Just kept tellin' her it would be all right. But it wasn't all right."

He went quiet then, his body going hollow, his limbs too light. Somewhere during the story, Stephanie had sunk down next to him, so that when he turned to her, their faces were only inches apart. "She was dead by the time the ambulance came," he whispered. "And it was my fault."

Stephanie shook her head profusely, her eyes racked with sorrow. "No, Jake, there was nothing you could have done. You can't blame yourself."

"I do blame myself. For bein' a cop. For takin' an assignment she asked me not to take. For bein' so goddamn arrogant as to think I could take my wife out to dinner like normal, knowin' I'd just been made for a cop by a drug ring, too stupid to realize Typhoeus would want to make an example outra me. I shoulda laid low." He sighed. "Shoulda done a lotta things different."

She ran comforting fingers back through his hair, and her touch... helped.

That was a hard thing to grab onto and acknowledge, because it was the first time anything had ever helped.

But it didn't take away the sting of the truth. He'd brought about Becky's death; if it wasn't for him and his job, she'd be alive today, and they'd have a kid, and life would be fine. Better than fine.

The thought wrenched his stomach even harder when he remembered he was lying naked in bed with another woman. A woman he kept having some damn intense feelings for, whether or not he chose to admit it to himself.

He'd just never thought he'd care about anyone else in that way. He'd thought sex now would be an occasional one-night stand, or a one-hour stand, for all he'd cared— he hadn't wanted anyone new in his life. He couldn't believe he'd let someone into his life.

He couldn't believe how good the sex was, how often she made him smile, how much she lightened his heart. And that made him hurt for Becky—it brought that same familiar sense of betrayal closing in.

"You made her happy," Stephanie said.

He lifted his gaze. How did she know? "Yeah, I did. I made her damn happy. Then I got her killed." He looked away. "So now you know—why I act like a bastard half the time, why I don't give a shit about anything, why I quit the force. Because I spend most of my time feelin' guilty about her, and about our baby." He shook his head, incredibly tired. "My life felt like it pretty much ended with hers."

"You don't."

"Huh?"

"You don't act like a bastard so much. Maybe when we first met, sometimes, but not lately."

He gave a short, somber nod against the pillow. It was true, he supposed. Like caring about food again. The food thing was small, but the not-acting-like-a-bastard part was bigger. He'd been happier lately.

"You'd have liked her," he said without planning it, the notion just entering his head. He could see the two of them being friends.

"I'm sure I would have."

"She was a lot more... genteel than me. Raised in a big house in Métairie, rich parents, country club—but she was the most down-to-earth person you could ever meet. And she kinda... pulled me up, made me believe I could be more than I thought I could."

"What do you mean?"

He cast her a glance. "Despite my mamère, I grew up pretty tough. When I was a teenager and started gettin' in trouble—fightin', raisin' hell—Mamère said I should use the roughness in me for good and become a cop. She made me promise on her deathbed that I would, so I did." He stopped, swallowed, remembering the guy he'd been in those in-between times—after Mamère, before Becky. Trying like hell to be good, but still bad to the bone inside. Too angry over his father, his mother, the loss of his grandma.

"So I was already a cop when I met Becky, but she made me a good cop. Until then, it'd been a job, a way to feel important, shove my weight around. But Becky turned me into a better man, somebody who wanted to help people and believed I could. Truth is, I guess Tony had a hand in that, too. But it was mostly Becky. Wantin' to prove to her I could be the person she thought I was."

"And now?"

"Now what?"

She touched his arm. "/ see that man in you, Jake. Even when you do act like a jerk, you still help me. But I'm just not sure...."

"What, chèreV

She let out a sigh. "I guess I'm still a little puzzled about why you traded in being a cop for tending bar at Sophia's. I mean—you're so much more than that, and at Sophia's, you're only ..."

He didn't make her finish, didn't make her tell him what a worthless existence he led now, because he already knew. "It's because I don't care anymore. Don't give a damn, about anyone or anything. Because carin' only gets you kicked in the couilles."

"Always?"

"For me, yeah—always. You care about somebody and they either die, or they die inside—like my mother, or they let you down. Carin's a lost cause."

Her sigh said she thought he was wrong, but she hadn't been where he'd been—she didn't know. They stayed awkwardly silent for a few minutes, until she said, "How did you end up working at Sophia's anyway?" He suspected it was an attempt to alleviate the tension now permeating the air.

He could go for that, too. "My friend Danny, who manages Sophia's—he knew me when I was a cop, and he knew I was down and needed an easy way to pay the bills."

"So no one at Sophia's cared that you used to be a cop and now you're serving drinks to people who are doing something illegal?"

"Nobody knows. To everybody on the third floor, I'm just a bartender named Jake."

"They didn't recognize you from—" She stopped abruptly, then let out a heavy breath, not quite meeting his eyes. "Well, I'm guessing Becky's death made the news."

He couldn't quite meet hers, either, now that they were back to this. "The media was good enough to keep my face out of it—they'll do that for cops sometimes in especially hideous situations. And I had a beard and longer hair at the time, for the undercover work—just hadn't gotten around to takin' it off."

From his peripheral vision, he caught the inquisitive tilt of Stephanie's head. "And there's nothing inside you that cares about the girls at Sophia's, nothing that thinks what happens there is wrong?"

He turned to look at her again, surprised. He'd just spilled his guts to her about causing his wife's death, and she was questioning him about the girls at Chez Sophia? "What are you gettin' at, chèreV

She lifted her gaze. "When I first met you, you didn't seem like someone who would care about that sort of thing. But now ... now I can't help but think that, deep down, you do. You must. You're too good of a man not to."

He blinked, wondering if she'd caught him in a tie, another tie to himself. He pushed the question away. "Losin' Becky taught me one thing, beb. It's that you can't save anybody, take care of anybody. It's useless to try."

"You're taking care of the runaway girl," she said softly.

He shrugged, sorry to be reminded. "I shouldn't be, if I had any sense. Because in the end, it won't matter—I won't be able to help her. She needs more help than I can give."

"Every night you keep her off the street matters, Jake." He just shook his head, feeling resolute, and wondering exactly when he had started this business again of taking care of people, of thinking any good could really come from it.

"And you're helping me, too, with Tina."

Ah—that's when it had started. With Miss Chardon-nay. "Only so you wouldn't get yourself—"

"I know," she cut him off. "In trouble. But you're helping me in other ways, too." She reached out to touch him, her hand skimming across his chest, down his stomach. "I've never had this with a man before. You know that."

They'd had this discussion a number of times, yet something in the words made him feel a little panicky just now; he suddenly heard them a whole new way. "Never had what exactly, chèreT

"Great sex."

Relief filled him. Thank God that was all she said, nothing more.

And that was exactly what they had.

Even if his heart argued there was more to it. Even if it beat harder than it should right now, each pulsation reminding him that—like it or not—he had feelings for her. Feelings that assaulted him in his dreams, and feelings that were assaulting him just as brutally outside the dreams.

Overwhelming guilt pummeled him with a brand-new fear, one he'd only admitted to himself this very second. What if he was falling in love with her? With another woman he couldn't allow to depend on him too much. Another woman who wasn't the woman he'd promised to love and take care of forever. Another woman he'd let down in the end if he allowed his feelings to go any further.

"Thank you, Jake," she said.

He met her eyes, hating in that moment how damn pretty they were, the way they always drew him in. "For?" "Telling me."

He shouldn't have. He scarcely knew why he had. Because you're falling in love with her. No. No fucking way. "We should sleep," he said. "All right," she whispered.

He made sure not to touch her as slumber took him. Safer that way. Safer for him. Safer for her. This couldn't be love. He wouldn't let it.

Sun glancing through the curtains forced Stephanie's eyes open. She knew without even peeking over that Jake lay next to her—she felt his massive strength; she drank in the musky, manly scent of him.

When he'd first told her he'd been married, her first reaction had been instant—and insane—jealousy. To think he'd had a wife. That deep connection, vowing your life to someone. It had made her feel like nothing, a tiny blip on his radar screen.

But when he'd told her the rest of it, her heart had broken for him. Dear God, no wonder he'd seemed so angry when they met. And to think he held himself responsible for Becky's death.

Impulse drew her closer to him. She simply leaned up against him, taking in his warmth, studying St. Michael busy vanquishing evil on his arm.

He stirred, sliding that arm around her, pulling her against him. She went willingly, her stomach swirling with how good he felt, how she wished she could somehow press herself into him, be a part of him, find a way to diminish his pain.

Their eyes met in the morning light, his sleepy but warm as he leaned to kiss her forehead. He spoke softly. "I shouldn't have told you all that."

"Why not?'

"I shouldn't have dumped it on you. It's too much." "I don't mind. I'm glad I know. And I kind of twisted your arm."

He sighed. "You're sweet, beb, but even so ... me and you, this, it's just..."

She bit her Up, waiting, tensing, praying he didn't feel her body go rigid.

"It's ... fun, easy. I like things the way they are, and I shouldn't have muddied it up with such serious shit."

"I've told you some pretty serious shit, too."

'True. But what you told me enabled us to have some really good sex, so it doesn't count against you." He winked.

She smiled at him, but didn't feel it inside, because even though she knew what they had had was only fun, easy, casual sex, there were moments—like every time he looked in her eyes, every kiss, certainly every time he was inside her—when it felt like more. Just now, wanting to be so close to him—it was a nearly overpowering need.

Could easy fun be so intense? She didn't know. Maybe she was blowing this out of proportion. But while last night on the way to meet him she'd been able to smile about having an affair, and a lover, this morning the words didn't hold such grand appeal. They sounded far emptier than what she felt when she looked into his eyes.

Relax. Your body, your muscles. She couldn't let him know she was going schoolgirl and romantic on him. To turn it into something it wasn’t would only make her look foolish and ruin everything good they’d shared. She had a feeling Jake Broussard didn’t do romantic.

Except maybe with his wife.

She could deny it, she’d heard the gentle cadence of true romance in his voice when he’d spoken of her. Hence the irrational jealously.

What was the problem here? Now that she knew Jake could do romance, she suddenly wanted that with him?

“Help me shop for Shondra today?” he enquired, eyebrows raising slightly.

She blinked. “Shondra? Oh, the runaway? Of course.” Her heart warmed at simply being asked, just as it had last night. You’re a silly, silly woman, Stephanie.

“Now,” he said, “a much more important question. How do you think Mrs Lindman will feel about you bringin’ your lover to breakfast?”

There it was again, lover. Sexy-sounding, especially coming in his deep drawl, but still…suddenly…she wished the word meant more than “guy I’m having sex with.” Damn it, she’d been doing so well with the affair concept. Yet maybe this was inevitable. Maybe it was impossible not to feel something serious for the first guy since college to inspire real passion in her. It had been easy to be worldly and mature with other men, who made her feel so little, but this was the opposite end of the spectrum.

She smiled anyway and forced herself into the moment. “I think it’s breakfast in bed for us today.”

He grinned. “Suits me just fine.”

She eased out from under the covers, still in his T-shirt. “I’ll go grab us some muffins or something.”

“Don’t forget to wear panties.” He winked. “The indiscretion might be a little more obvious in the light of day.”

She laughed—for the moment, drawn back into the easy, fun part. "I'll have to see if I can find any you haven't ripped to shreds."

He put his hands behind his head and watched her as she dug in a drawer, and she liked feeling his gaze bum through her. "Maybe while we're out shopping' today," he said, "we'll buy you some new ones."

"These." Jake held up a tiny pair of flesh-colored thong panties.

She cast a skeptical smile. She liked nice lingerie, but she'd never worn a thong before. "That looks a bit like a torture device. Don't suppose I could ask you to look for something more comfortable."

"Fact is, chère, I've heard they aren't as uncomfortable as they look."

She laughed. "Surveyed the girls at Sophia's, have you? Or is it a more personal study?"

He raised a wicked grin. "Let's just say I'm a connoisseur of fine panties and leave it at that." He leaned closer then, and spoke low. "Although I wasn't thinkin' about comfort when I picked these out. I was bein' far more selfish—thinkin' about how hot you'd look."

Her whole body went warm as she snatched the panties from his hand. "All right—for you, I'll wear them."

He bent for a quick kiss, his eyes so sexy that for a second she couldn't believe she got to sleep with this gorgeous man. "Only two more to go," he said, switching his gaze to the 3 for $20 sign.

Lowering her shopping bag to the floor, she began rifling through stacks of underwear on the same table Jake continued perusing. She liked that he wasn't one of those guys who stood around Victoria's Secret with his hands in his pockets, looking sheepish. It thrilled her to let him pick out something sexy for her.

It was to be their last stop at the Riverwalk Marketplace, as they'd already bought Shondra a bag full of clothes from both The Gap and Abercrombie & Fitch. Stephanie had enjoyed picking out cute shorts and summery tops for the girl, as well as finding a simple black skirt and low-heeled sandals that would work for job hunting. They were guessing at sizes, but figured some exchanging could be done if necessary since the mall that hugged the Mississippi was within walking distance of Jake's place.

Within a few moments, each of them held up another pair of undoes. Stephanie's were lavender, while Jake's were black and predictably ultraskimpy. So skimpy that she laughed when she saw them. "Do they even serve a purpose?"

He blinked. "Of course. Pleasin' your lover."

There it was again, that word. God, it did sound sexy rolling off Jake's tongue. And that—being his lover— would have to be enough. It wasn't as if she really had a choice anyway. She'd have to view it as she had in the beginning, and as Jake undoubtedly did—as a pleasant way to pass the nights while they searched for Tina.

She smiled, taking them from his hand. "All right. With my pair, that makes three."

In response, he grabbed away the lavender panties and held them up, looking at the regular bottom as if it didn't quite meet his approval.

Giggling tightly, she snatched them back. "These are very much like the ones I was wearing last night. And I didn't notice you complaining about those."

One corner of his mouth tilted upward. "You're right, beb. You look real pretty in anything you wear, or in nothin' at all." He reached for her hand and lowered a slower, more lingering kiss to her mouth. When it was through, leaving her stomach filled with happy butterflies, he spoke softly. "We'd better go get lunch before I'm tempted to have my way with you right here."

She bit her lip. "That makes lunch sound pretty boring."

When had she become this woman who wanted to be ravished in the middle of a mall? she wondered, laughing. When had she become this wild thing eager to squeeze into naughty lingerie for her man's pleasure?

Mmm, this was fun. Easy. Just like Jake said.

Keep it that way, she warned herself.

"Oooh, chère," he said, reaching past her for a hanger holding a transparent, flesh-colored negligee trimmed in bits of mauve lace. "You look pretty in anything, but you'd look damn fine in this."

She bit her lip, studying it. Much more revealing than any of the standard lingerie she'd ever owned. Imagining how it would feel to have Jake's eyes on her when she wore it—and Jake's hands peeling it off her—made her tingle. "I think so, too," she said, gazing up at him.

"Now, that's what I like to hear," he purred before taking the handful of undoes from her fist and heading toward the cash register to pay.

When an earlier conversation had revealed to Jake that she'd not yet tried a po'boy, he'd put that on the menu for lunch, so they soon settled at a table with a river view after grabbing some sandwiches from Messina's, to which Jake added a side of red beans and rice. View or not, though, Stephanie couldn't quite take her eyes off Jake as they ate and chatted.

"Have to work tonight, beb," he said. "And after that, I'm drivin' out to the bayou house for a couple days."

For a moment, Stephanie forgot to breathe, but at least she didn't gasp. Given all their sexy talk while shopping, she just hadn't envisioned ... But she held in her sigh and tried not to be hurt. "Guess my sexy new panties will have to wait." She only hoped she sounded as natural and unaffected as she wanted to be. Easy and fun. That's what this is. Get that through your head.

He gave her a slow smile, enough to bury her in desire if she let it. "Gives me somethin' to look forward to," he said, then changed the subject to a topic much more important than her sexual urges. "I'll check with Tony before I go, though, and let you know if there's any news on Tina. And I'll give him your number at the LaRue in case he needs to reach you. Otherwise, I'll get down to checkin' out some spots in the CBD myself when I get back. Think you can stay put 'til then?"

Despite wanting to be totally cool about his departure, she took a saucy attitude. "Frankly, you're testing my patience. What am I supposed to do with myself for these days you're away?" And these nights, too.

He gave her a chiding grin. "Go see a movie. Go to the aquarium. Take the ferry over to Algiers—you'd like it over there, real quaint. Just do anything besides what you know you're not supposed to do."

She sighed. She'd promised, and she'd truly intended to keep the promise this time. But New Orleans sounded dreadfully boring without him. "You're a tease," she accused.

He rubbed his knees against hers under the table as he cast an apologetic smile. "Even so, you'll be a good girl while I'm gone, no?"

"I guess I could do some work while I'm waiting for news on Tina." Although the truth was that she no longer even cared if they got the phone company account. Trying to make one long-distance service seem better than the next had somehow ceased to seem important. The only thing motivating her at this point was her sense of responsibility, the fact that other employees depended on her, that her work reflected on her entire team.

"You, uh, don't sound too excited about that, chère."

"I suppose my work doesn't hold the thrill it used to."

He tilted his head. "That surprises me. You seem like a woman who'd be all about work."

"I suppose worrying about my sister has made the corporate rat race seem... a bit like a rat race," she said on a soft laugh. So much so that the revelation startled her. Whereas a few weeks ago her job had been everything to her, she realized that she didn't miss going into Grable & Harding every day—at all. She didn't miss her power suits or her power meetings, she didn't miss the high-tension atmosphere, she didn't miss all the glad-handing and executive fakery that was part and parcel of that world.

"Well, no rat race down here for you, beb."

You can say that again. The life she'd led since coming to the Big Easy, and the things she'd done with Jake, both in search of Tina and in bed—it was like having entered an entirely new universe. And it was suddenly hard to imagine that old world seeming like enough.

On the way toward the mall's exit, Stephanie stopped in front of another lingerie shop, this one featuring bath products in the front window. "I bet Shondra could use some new underwear, too," she said, the idea just striking her.

He gave her a look of caution. "Uh, no—I'm not buyin' the girl underwear. She's a cool kid, but she's a little skittish sometimes about me bein' a man, and... just... no way."

She bit her lip, smiled up at him, and proceeded into the store anyway, knowing he'd follow.

"What are you doin' ?" he asked over her shoulder as she quickly grabbed up two pairs of good cotton panties—pink and yellow—as well as a bottle of peach body wash.

"What size bra do you think she might wear?"

He blinked at her disbelievingly. "How the hell do you think I'd know somethin' like that?'

She laughed. "You're right. Sorry. Guess we'll have to forgo that item." Then she headed toward the checkout, laying her purchases on the counter.

"Didn't you hear me, beb? I'm not givin' her panties."

She smiled up at him as the sales associate wrapped the undoes and body wash in yellow tissue paper, placing them in a dainty matching shopping bag. "Just tell her this bag's from me. She can open it privately and you can pretend you have no idea what's inside." When he still looked skeptical, she peered up into his eyes. "A girl needs these things, Jake." The truth was, just since mentioning Tina's name over lunch, she couldn't help but wonder if her sister had fresh underwear to put on, soap to wash with, wherever she might be. Making sure another down-on-her-luck girl had them was the least she could do. "Just tell her a... lady friend helped you shop and wanted to add this."

He gazed down into her eyes, his expression going warmer, until he said, "You know something, chère! You're a pretty damn sweet lady friend."

The truth was, he didn't want to go to the bayou house after work. He wanted to stay here, with Stephanie. He wanted to make love to her 'til they were both breathless.

But good sense had prevailed. He couldn't get in any deeper with her. Didn't mean they couldn't keep getting together while she was here, but it couldn't be every night, and he sure as hell couldn't go confiding any more secrets in her. He had to keep it light, casual, fun—just like he'd made a point of mentioning this morning in bed. That had to be enough.

He'd decided not to panic over whatever it was he felt for her. His thoughts while failing asleep last night had been ... well, crazy, that was all. An example of what great sex, bad memories, and exhaustion could do to you.

Yes, he felt something for her that turned him warm every time she came to mind—but he just wasn't ready for anything more than what they already had. Having fun with a woman, that was good. Sharing hot sex—also good. Definite steps in the right direction for getting his life back on track. That very concept had seemed impossible until just a few days ago, so being with Stephanie wasn't something he would deny himself. He just had to keep her at a certain distance. And putting some miles and time between them would do that—help him put all this in the right perspective. Then, in a few days, he'd come back to town and they'd be together again.

Sounded like an eternity.

Too damn bad.

The apartment was quiet when he came in. He lowered the shopping bags to the floor just inside as Shondra's mutt came trotting across the old linoleum to meet him, furry tail wagging, tongue lolling.

"You keep forgettin' I don't like you, mangy dog," he said as he bent to give the pooch a quick scratch behind the ears anyway. "But don't be lookin' to me for anything to eat. If I know little miss Shondra, she's keepin' you well fed."

Speaking of which—where was she? He made his way down the hall, pausing in the doorway when he found her asleep on his bed. He didn't wake her, knowing she was used to sleeping during the day.

When the phone rang, he hurried to grab it. "What's up, pard?" he asked when he heard Tony's voice.

"Slow day, so I started checking around for leads on this Raven girl. Quite a few people in the CBD seem to know her, but nobody's seen her lately. And I found another guy who might have seen Tina, too."

"No shit?" In a way, Stephanie's sister had begun to seem spectral to him, a ghost of a girl who would never turn up.

"Doorman at the Courtview, little old hotel that caters to businessmen traveling cheap."

"I know the place," Jake said—he'd once broken up a fight there back in his early days in blue. "What'd he

say?"

"Didn't remember her by name, but the pictures and the association with Raven made him think he'd seen her pass through the lobby, looking for a pickup."

"How long ago?"

"A few weeks, at least. Said she and Raven were together, and it was probably the last time he'd seen Raven, too."

Jake nodded to himself. "Okay. That's something anyway." But not much. "Listen, I know I gave you Stephanie's number, but don't call her about this. No need to get her hopes up until there's somethin' more concrete."

"Got it."

"And by the way, I'm headin' out to the bayou house tonight, so I gave her your cell number, too—in case she wants to check with you while I'm gone."

"That's fine," he said, then slowly added, "About Stephanie..."

"Uh, what about her?"

Tony only laughed and Jake wished he were better at playing dumb. "I'm your best friend. Come clean with me."

"She's a nice woman who needs my help."

"Dude," Tony said, "you two looked like you were about to do it on the dance floor."

Jake couldn't help chuckling softly at the reminder. He'd sort of forgotten Tony had witnessed all that heat, and he supposed it made his lies even more useless. "Okay—yeah, we got together."

Tony stayed quiet for a moment, and Jake could almost feel his friend's smile. "So you got yourself laid by a pretty girl, huh?"

"I just said so, didn't I?" Jake grumbled, but neither of them would deny this meant way more than just some regular guy getting lucky. He knew Tony would see it as a return to the land of the living, and he couldn't refute it.

"Well, that's some damn good news, man."

"But it's just... you know ... casual. Fun in bed."

"That's good enough, dude. I'm glad you're back in the saddle."

He laughed. "Yeah, me too. I mean ... it's good." He was quick to add, "Only fun, but good."

He looked up to see Shondra enter the room with a sleepy-eyed yawn.

"Listen, pard, thanks for helpin' me out with Stephanie's sister, but I gotta take off. I'll call when I'm back." He hung up and gave Shondra a small smile. "Hey there, 'tite fille. You finally wakin' up?"

She nodded, but looked sheepish. "Sorry I stole your bed. But it was almost morning, so I figured you wouldn't be usin' it."

"No problem—you were right."

She blinked, as if trying to clear the sleep from her head, then scrunched up her nose. "So ... where you been? I mean, if it's 'cause I was here ..."

He shook his head. "No such thing, 'tite fille. I'm fine with you bein' here—I told you that. As for where I slept... well, my grandma had an old house out in Terrebonne Parish and sometimes I hang out there."

She tipped her head back slightly. "Oh. I thought maybe you were gettin' your groove on with some girl."

She said it easily enough that he thought, Hell, what's the point of lying? "Okay, well, actually, last night I was with a woman. Tonight I'm headed out to the bayou for a couple of days, though, so I'll leave a little cash on the dresser for food or anything else you need while I'm gone."

Her eyes opened wider. "You don't got to leave me money."

He sighed. Merde. If she was arguing over cash for food, how would she react to two shopping bags full of clothes? "Shondra, I want you to eat decent while I'm gone." The dog stood panting happily at her feet, so to drive the point home, he added, "Hell, I don't even mind if he eats good." Then he tried another approach. "In fact, you'd be doin' me a favor if you got some groceries in this place. Whatever you want—stuff that's simple to fix."

"What if you don't like what I pick?"

Twill. I'm easy."

"Speakin' of that..."

"Huh?"

She bit her Up. "Who's the woman? The one you were with?"

He drew back slightly, shocked, although with Shondra, he figured he shouldn't be. "Know what I like about you, 'tite fille! You're direct as hell."

She shifted her weight from one bare foot to the other. "The reason I'm askin' is ... am I crimpin' your style by bein' here? I mean ..."

He shook his head. "Just the opposite, you wanna know the truth. She thinks I'm sweet as hell for lookin' after you some."

She relaxed a little. "Oh. Well... good." She dropped onto the couch, and glanced up at him, her interest suddenly seeming more girlish than worried. "What's her name?"

"Stephanie."

"You in love with her? Or is it just sex?"

He'd have been bothered by the first question if the second hadn't made him laugh at his world-wise little roommate. "Somewhere in between those two."

"But it ain't nothin' serious?"

He shook his head, perhaps a bit too hurriedly. "She's only in town temporarily. Be goin' back up to Chicago soon."

"She on vacation or somethin'?"

Given how world-wise she was, he decided to tell her the rest of it, to let her know bad stuff could happen to girls who ran away from home. "She's down here lookin' for her sister, Tina. Girl came down here, must've got into a rough crowd, and ended up turnin' tricks for a livin'. Stephanie hasn't been able to find her and she's worried somethin' bad happened."

He saw the mystery and fear pass through Shondra's gaze. "Do you think somethin' bad happened?"

A week ago, he'd have shaken his head. But somewhere along the way, he'd changed his mind. A girl didn't just disappear that easy. "I'm not sure, but... I'm worried, too." He tilted his head and used the easy segue for a question he'd asked her before. "Bet you got somebody at home worryin' about you, too—no?"

"I told you, my mama probably ain't even noticed I'm gone. She's too wrapped up in her big white lover boy. No offense."

He nodded, amused that she kept slipping up on that. "None taken. But besides your mom, I mean. Gotta be somebody else who loves you, Shondra, somebody we could at least call in order to put their mind at ease."

An answer burned in her eyes, but she stayed quiet.

"A grandma or a grandpa, maybe an aunt or an uncle, somebody you trust. Even just a girlfriend."

He watched as she slowly drew in her breath, then finally said, "Look, I know you're just tryin' to help, and you been real cool. But me and home ... that's history. I'd rather talk about Stephanie some more. Is she nice?"

"Very." It made him glance toward the little yellow shopping bag at the door, as well as the others.

He didn't think this was gonna go over well, but there was no time like the present—especially since he needed to get to Sophia's soon and planned to leave town right after the third floor emptied.

Shondra followed his eyes. "What's in the bags?"

He got up, walked over, and carried them back to the couch. "Some clothes."

"Your Stephanie buy you some presents?" she asked with a light, romantic little smile unlike anything he'd ever seen on Shondra before.

"Actually, we went shopping' for you."

"Huh?" Her expression went blank with shock.

"Just figured you could use a few things is all."

She simply stared at the bags, her face turning a little red. He couldn't read her reaction, so he decided he'd best try to win her over quick. Plunging his hand in one shopping bag, he came up with a denim skirt Stephanie had promised him any teenage girl would "die for."

True to Stephanie's prediction, Shondra gasped.

He next got a handful of cotton, extracting two little teenybopper T-shirts from Abercrombie & Fitch. They earned another gasp and an "Off the hook!"

He raised his gaze. "You like 'em, no?"

"Like 'em?" She ran her hand across the denim stretched over both their knees. "I love 'em! They're slammin' !" He watched her study the tops and skirt as if they were the greatest treasures she'd ever beheld, and a fresh warmth filled his heart. She likes the clothes.

"Don't know for sure they'll fit," he said, digging out two pairs of shorts and another top, "but if they don't, we'll go trade 'em in for ones that do."

Her eyes were glued to the clothes filling their laps. "No, they'll fit. I'm sure!"

Next came a black skirt and white blouse. "I mentioned to Stephanie you wantin' to look for a job, and she said you could wear this. There are shoes down in the bottom here," he said, reaching in the other bag.

"Shoes? This is off the damn hinges!"

As he rose back up with the shoe box, he felt her touch on his shoulder and turned to face her.

"Thank you, Jake," she said softly.

He wanted to hug her. But he didn't—still didn't want to take a chance on scaring her that way. So he simply said, "You're welcome, 'titefille."

"Why are you so nice to me?"

He shrugged. "You're a cool kid. Only kid I could feel comfortable tellin' I spent last night with a woman, that's for sure," he said on a laugh. "You're like hangin' out with a slightly miniature adult with bad taste in dogs."

"Hey!" she said, giving him a playful slug in the arm. "Don't dis Scruff."

"Scruff's a damn menace is what he is."

"Scruff's a good dog. Coolest damn dog I've ever known."

He pointed at her. 'That reminds me. Don't cuss when you're talkin' to prospective employers."

"Why not, damn it?" she said, straight-faced.

He broke into laughter, then he gave her a playful punch—just as he remembered that one more bag remained on the floor. He reached down, grabbed the ropy yellow handles, and handed it to her. "This is from Stephanie."

She looked as awed by the pretty little bag as she did by the clothes.

"Said it was strictly from her to you and that you should open it in private. So after I head off to work in a minute, you can check it out."

Her face dropped slightly. "You're leavin' already?"

He nodded, feeling bad.

"It's no big deal," she said. "I just... ya know... like hangin' with you some."

"Yeah, I like hangin' with you okay, too."

Stephanie spent the rest of the day working ... and not working. She caught up on e-mail and reviewed some files her team members had forwarded via computer—but her heart wasn't in it and she found herself drawn back to her crocheting. Somewhere along the way, she'd become determined to finish that damn scarf. Homage to Tina or whatever else it might be, she just wanted to prove to herself she could do one more thing outside her normal realm of activities. She liked all the new parts of herself she'd discovered since coming to this decadent city, and she didn't want to lose them yet.

She'd also exchanged a few e-mails with Melody— who, it seemed, had no other clues to give, adding, I'm so sorry you haven't located her. I wish there was more I could do. At which point she'd told Melody about Raven and her link to the CBD. Melody had replied with a list of places in the Central Business District that she'd once heard were frequented by hookers. Although, unfortunately, she didn't know Raven—Since I stuck to the upper-class venues and never worked that area. Safer that way, you know. Stephanie had thanked her for the list, planning to give it to Jake and Tony, and tried not to think about the CBD being a more dangerous place for an escort to ply her trade.

In between all this, her mind drifted repeatedly to Jake and all that had happened since last night. They'd had fabulous sex and he'd told her about his wife's tragic death. They'd had fabulous sex and they'd shopped for Shondra, and for her as well, and he'd been sexy and flirtatious and not at all a man who seemed mired in tragedy. They'd had fabulous sex and he'd told her he was heading to the bayou for a couple of days. And then there was the fabulous sex.

She went to bed early, feelings for him still badgering her. She'd once thought him an enigma, but now she thought of him simply as a man with a lot of pain inside, a man who—without knowing it—maybe needed someone to take care of him a little bit.

After tossing and turning for half an hour, she glanced to see the digital clock said it was only a few minutes after ten—prime time at Sophia's third floor. Sitting up, she switched on a lamp and looked across the room to the pretty pink bag containing the lingerie Jake had selected for her. Then she reached for the slip of paper he'd given her with Tony's number—she'd tucked it beneath the phone next to the bed.

Nerves bit at her as she dialed. She had no idea if this was the right thing to do, and maybe she should just forget it and hang up. Maybe she should do exactly what Jake had said—for once—and stay put until he got back.

"Hello?"

"Tony? This is Stephanie Grant. Jake's friend."

"Why, hello there, Stephanie." He sounded so merry that she decided not to apologize for calling so late. "What can I do for you?"

"I have ... what might sound like an odd question."

"Shoot."

"You know Jake's grandma's house on the bayou?" "Sure."

"Well, Jake is planning to head out there tonight after work and I was wondering ... if you'd give me driving directions." No more leaky boats for her. If she was going to intrude on him there again, she was at least going to be sensible about it this time.

"Uh, yeah, sure, but... if you just need to speak with him or something, I have his number at work."

She took a deep breath and thought, Oh, what the hell. "Actually, the truth is, I kind of want to surprise him, at the house."

"I see." He still sounded happy, thankfully.

"Do you know if he keeps it locked?"

"Yeah, he does. But lucky for you, I have a key."

"Really?" she asked, not so surprised to hear he had a key, but that he was willing to give it to her, no questions asked.

"I used to do some fishing there. But I haven't gone out since Jake started heading to the house by himself so much." He paused, adding as if they were conspirators, "You know, don't you, that he usually goes there to be alone?"

"Well, he never told me that, but I presumed." Another deep breath, another truth. "I just... don't think he wants to be alone tonight as much as he might think he does."

She practically felt Tony's smile. "I like you, Stephanie."

Jake pulled up to the house beneath a canopy of cypress and tupelo gum trees, surprised to see the front porch light on. What the hell... ?

He got out of the truck, but didn't slam the door—not wanting to alert whoever waited inside that they had company.

Merde. Who the hell could be in there? They'd had to break in—no other way to turn the porch light on except from the inside. And who on earth would break in and then announce their presence with the damn porch light?

Climbing up in the bed of the truck, he opened the toolbox mounted behind the cab and pulled out a hammer. No chance against anything that held bullets, but he felt thankful he had any sort of weapon—glad he'd driven instead of taken the pirogue.

He took slow steps toward the house when something crunched beneath his shoe. He looked down, squinting. Was that a... ?

Stooping, he found the remains of a round white mint crushed to pieces on the hard-packed dirt. He shook his

head, figuring he must've somehow dropped it the last time he'd driven out here—but why hadn't some animal carried it off by now?

A few steps farther, though, and he discovered another mint on the ground. And looking ahead, he saw still more lying in a loose trail that led up to the steps and onto the rickety porch.

He wanted to be irritated as hell.

But instead he only smiled. And followed the trail.

Stepping up on the porch, he lowered his hammer to the sagging boards, then pushed through the unlocked door to find a fine of mints dotting the floor that led through the living room into the kitchen. There, the mints lay among the debris of new flooring materials and tools, leading to the bedroom—where he was drawn by the familiar glow of a lamp still missing one bulb.

He stepped up to the doorway, crossing his arms as he leaned against the jamb. Stephanie lay on her side in bed, propped on one elbow. She wore the sexy, flesh-colored slip he'd bought for her today—it clung to every curve, and left her as close to naked as a woman could be with that much fabric on. The round globes of her breasts stretched the sheer slip prettily, showing off dark, erect nipples. At her hip, he saw the flesh-colored lace of the thong he'd selected.

"Mint?" she asked, holding out an open roll.

He grinned, motioning to the line of them that led to the bed. "Got some already, thanks."

Lifting her free arm from where it draped sexily at her waist, she curled one finger toward her.

He moved nearer, their eyes locking in the dim light, and kneeled next to the bed to bring them face-to-face. Leaning in, he delivered a slow, warm kiss—then gave a light laugh. "You taste minty."

"Well," she said with a teasing expression, "all the cool kids are doing it, so I tried it, too. Afraid I'm hooked now."

"An expensive habit," he replied. "At least seventy-five cents a day. Think you can afford it?"

"I might have to sell my body."

He glanced down at her curves showing so clearly through the meshy fabric, "/might have to buy it."

She bit her Up, somehow able to look both sexy and sheepish at the same time. "I'm ... sorry I came out here like this. I was just..." She shook her head softly.

He let out a laugh. "Horny?"

She cast an indulgent grin. "No. Well, maybe. But I wouldn't have used that particular word." "What word would you use?" "Aroused, perhaps." "By?" "You."

"I wasn't anywhere near you, chère." "Doesn't matter."

"I must not know my own strength." He spared another glance for the negligee, which looked even better on her than he could have predicted. "But I have damn good taste, no?"

"Yes, and it seemed a shame to let it sit in a bag all night long when we could be putting it to good use." She drew in her breath. "I... hope it's okay. That I came."

He smiled—and allowed himself to be honest. He was so damn happy to see her he could barely measure it. "It's more than okay, beb. Layin' in my bed like that, you look like..."

"What?"

He let his smile widen, even though she couldn't possibly know why. "A dream come true."

She leaned closer, her eyes sparkling with heat. "I want to make your dreams come true, Jake Broussard."

He ran a hand over her hip, lowering another lingering kiss to her moist lips. "You already do." Then he chuckled. "You have no idea."

She grinned. "Having dirty dreams about me?"

"Maybe a time or two." Or ten.

"Then I'm glad I came out here, so you can have the real thing."

"Speakin' of which ..." He straightened slightly as a worrisome thought assaulted him. "You didn't take somebody's pirogue out here again, did you?"

She shook her head and he relaxed. "I drove. Tony gave me directions—and a key."

He grinned, imagining the kick his buddy must have gotten from this turn of events. "Where's your car?"

"I hid it. Parked behind some trees to the right of the house."

He arched a skeptical brow. "Stephanie Grant, PI, back on the job."

"A whole different kind of job," she said, her voice gone silky, sexy. She flashed a come-hither smile and he realized that, for a novice, Miss Stephanie did sexy extremely well.

Letting her expression seep into his bones, he pushed to his feet and stripped off his T-shirt. Below him, Stephanie reached up to press her palm over the ridge of his erection and he sucked in his breath at her heavenly touch.

"Tell me something. What if I'd come by pirogue? I wouldn't have found your mints."

She squeezed lightly and smiled up at him. "There happens to be a trail of mints in that direction, too."

With that, she shifted to her knees to work at his belt buckle, her moves brisk without being hurried, and watching her toil to get him undressed made his skin sizzle with anticipation. After unzipping, she pushed down the jeans and he helped her until they dropped to his ankles. She wasted no time in lowering his underwear as well.

"I want to make you feel so good, Jake," she whispered, her voice filled with a sweet, hungry desperation that nearly buried him.

He reached to cup her face, thread his fingers back through her loose hair. "You do, beb. Mon Dieu, you do."

She sighed below him, looking somehow bereft. "But... more than that," she said. "I want to... make you forget. I want to make it so ... so there's only me and you. Nothing to hurt us. Nothing to hurt you. No painful memories. No guilt. Just good things."

He swallowed past the lump that had just risen in his throat with the realization that. . . "You do that, too, beb. You make me forget. When I'm with you..." How to explain? It felt so complicated inside him—and yet, so utterly simple, too. "When I'm with you, there is nothin' else."

She continued peering up at him from below as she licked her lips, then lowered her mouth over him. His breath went instantly ragged, his hands slowly kneading her hair and scalp. He had to brace his knees to keep from going down as spirals of sensation swirled through his torso, chest, thighs.

He watched her, her ministrations brimming with so much emotion—and that was what was burying him. He'd told her once that it was the act of connecting with a woman's body that moved him the most—but somehow, right now, he found himself thinking this was the most amazing sex he'd ever had. He knew no woman had ever given him more of herself.

When she reached for his hand and drew him onto the bed, he was more than happy to snuggle in close against the rise and fall of her body, their tongues mingling in slow, thorough passion. Part of him could have lain there all night, just kissing her, touching her. But he craved more, so he found himself moving south.

She sighed beneath him, soft and pretty, as he pulled the slip down over her breasts, the elasticized fabric catching on the underside. He drew one rigid peak between his lips, feeling each pull in the small of his back, the muscles of his thighs, and—of course—between his legs. He'd not thought to put on any of Mamère's albums, but Stephanie's sweet, tender moans mixed with the night sounds of the bayou beyond the window to provide the perfect music.

His kisses trailed down over her smooth stomach through the slip, past the shadow of her belly button, until he was pushing the fabric up over her thighs to her waist to bestow a firm, nipping kiss to the front of her new panties. He drew back, casting a wicked grin. "Pretty, chère."

She returned the sexy smile. "Happy with your selection, hmm?"

He replied with a slow nod. "Very." Then he whispered, "Roll over."

Slowly, she complied, drawing her knees up under her. Despite the heat, he shivered at the sight. Crazy, he knew—he'd seen women in thongs before. But this was Stephanie, his Stephanie, who'd loosed her inner desires for him, who'd turned his dreams to reality. Steep arousal drew his hands to her bottom to mold the round flesh— before he reached for the strip of lace above, easing it down until the thong dropped past her thighs. "Please," she whimpered.

Her need thrilled him. "Please what, beb? Tell me what you want."

"I want you inside me."

His need went as thick as the bayou heat. He bestowed one gentle kiss to the small of her back before easing into her. "How's that?" he asked, sliding deeper.

"Mmm, yes, perfect," she said through breathy sighs.

Within seconds, he was driving into her with an uncontrolled heat, and she met each stroke in that perfect rhythm, so ancient and impossible to improve upon—and no, this was the most amazing sex he'd ever experienced.

No, every union with Stephanie was amazing, equally amazing, impossibly amazing.

"Mon Dieu," he breathed helplessly—that quickly pushed over the edge of desire. And then the pleasure swept him away, up to the sky, down to the bottom of the deepest ocean. It made him think of the dream where he saw everything, every color, every world—and it was all about Stephanie. He rode out the pulses inside her until he slowly came back to himself, back to the bed, back to the woman who'd somehow started filling his world without him ever knowing it, and now she was almost all he knew.

He collapsed softly atop her, managing to lower an exhausted kiss to her neck. "I'm sorry, beb" he whispered.

"Sorry?" She sounded truly puzzled.

He couldn't help letting out a small laugh. Nice thing about a woman not real experienced at passion—she didn't realize he should have been able to give her a lot more. "Sorry I finished so fast." He stroked a hand through her hair, bent to nip at her earlobe. "I wanted to go all night in you."

She rolled from beneath him until they lay in a loose embrace, her body still sheathed in the clingy slip, stretched in beautiful, wild disarray across her skin. "I don't think I could take that all night, Jake."

Her smile warmed him, made him try to stay awake through the lethargy that came after climax. "Still, I wanted to give you more. I didn't even make you come."

She shook her head. "I don't think it's always about that for me. Remember when you told me your favorite part was the connection? Well, I think that's my favorite part, too. With or without an orgasm. I love the way you feel in me."

He buried his face against her shoulder and drank in her scent—something soft and flowery, remnants of the day's perfume. "I love bein' inside you, too." He lowered a kiss to her neck, but suffered a strange, soft wrench of his stomach. Had he just said too much? Almost too much?

He shut up, went quiet, just anchored his arm around her waist, pulled her close, and let the lure of sleep take him before he could worry anymore.

When Stephanie awoke, the lights were out, but the digital clock next to the bed said it was after three. The bed beside her was empty, yet the lulling sounds of insects reminded her Jake was probably out on the dock. She'd known instinctively from the first time she'd found him here that the bayou called to him in some way she'd probably never quite be able to fully understand.

Glancing down as her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw the hem of her sexy nightie hovering at her hips and remembered the hot abandon of their sex, how it had at once been so easy—easy to want to do everything with him—and at the same time so intense. Each time she made love with Jake, the heat between them ratcheted up a notch. Her body warmed at the memory as she lay back against the pillow and smiled. If only everything in life was as easy as Jake made sex for her.

Sitting up on the side of the bed, she pulled down her negligee, then padded across the hardwood floor and over the last remains of old linoleum in the kitchen until she was quietly opening the door, stepping outside. Jake sat on the glider in black boxer briefs, looking like every woman's fantasy. But her reality. "Hey," she said.

He raised his gaze, then dropped it to her nightie with a sensual smile. "You runnin' around without panties again, chère?'

"What can I say? You bring out the wild woman in me.

He patted the seat next to him and said, "I know I do. Come here."

She joined him, curling one leg comfortably beneath her, and he put his arm around her, drawing her in for a warm, openmouthed kiss. "Mmm, still minty."

"You too."

He drew back slightly to look at her. "I wonder what Mrs. Lindman would think if she could see you now— runnin' around with barely anything on out on the bayou."

She laughed. "I also wonder what she would think if she realized I didn't sleep in my room every night."

"Like I said before, I think she'd just be a little bit jealous."

"If she saw you, definitely."

He grinned. "You think I could turn Mrs. Lindman on, huh?"

"I think you could turn any girl on."

He leaned in, bringing their faces close. "Lucky for you, you're the only girl I'm wantin' to turn on, chère."

She kissed him again and it set her skin to tingling the same as if she were sixteen and on her first date. "Speaking of the barely-anything-I'm-wearing," she said, "did you give Shondra her clothes?"

He nodded, a slow smile reshaping his stubbled face. "She loved 'em."

Her heart warmed. "Really? Did they fit?"

"She hadn't tried 'em on yet when I left, but she thought they would. And if not. .. maybe you'll go with us? To trade 'em in?"

As before, the invitation touched her. "Yeah, sure, of course."

When they went quiet, Stephanie listened to the chirps and coos and calls around them, and found herself trying to pick out the individual noises that made up the cacophony of sound. The moon tossed a thin ribbon of light across the water, and the gnarled trees draped with Spanish moss were only dark shapes, sentinels that made the space feel unduly private, protected. "Tony told me you come here to be alone."

He looked down at her, his arm still wrapped around her. "Yeah. Mostly."

"It made me think twice about coming." She knew they'd had stupendous sex just an hour ago, but she still worried she was intruding somehow.

"Well... maybe I don't want to be alone as much as usual lately."

"Can I take that as a compliment?"

He pressed his forehead to hers and answered low. "Yes, beb. You can."

"Why are you rebuilding things? To have a better place to be alone?" She'd asked him about it before, but now had a feeling there was more to it.

He peered out over the black water. "Somethin' like that, maybe. Had this idea that someday I'd come out here to stay. That I'd have enough money to live a simple life here, just doin' a little fishin' to get by, or trappin' crawfish."

"You don't like living in the city?"

He glanced down at her. "Don't mind it so much lately, I guess. Minded it after Becky, though. Just couldn't see much there but trouble, and would've come out here permanently then if I'd had enough money. As it is, I make a lot for a guy who doesn't work much, and I don't spend most of it, except what I've put in to fixin' this place up. With an eye toward livin' here sometime down the road, like I said, and also ... 'cause it's Mamère's place. I just didn't want to see it fall apart. I feel her when I'm here, you know?"

She nodded, and leaned closer into him. Looked up into his eyes and hoped he saw the want in hers. His slow kiss said he did. "Come here," he whispered for the second time in a few minutes, but this time he pulled her up into his lap. She shifted to straddle him for a series of deep, open-mouthed kisses, their tongues colliding soft and sweet.

As one of his hands curled around her bottom, the other worked in tandem with his teeth, lowering her negligee over her breasts again. "You know what I like about this nightie?" he breathed, his voice hot as the night. "I can get to all your good parts without you even takin' it off."

She giggled, shimmying her breasts lightly. "Are you saying these are my only good parts?"

Instead of laughing with her, he flashed a sexy-as-sin look and dragged his hands over her waist, hips, thighs, and slowly up her arms, onto her shoulders ... neck... face. "Every single part of you is incredible, beb" he whispered. Only then did he chuckle softly and let his hands ease down to the sides of her breasts. "But I'd be lyin' if I said these weren't among my favorites."

He gazed up at her as he flicked the tip of his tongue across one turgid nipple, sending a bolt of pleasure and need straight to the juncture of her thighs. As he kissed her aching breasts, her hands sank between them, reaching to free him from the barrier that separated them. Their foreheads touched as she lowered herself onto him, their bodies meeting with slick ease, their ragged breathing seeming to drown out the bayou sounds.

He ran his thumb across her lower lip, his eyes riveted on her half-open mouth before he kissed her, the connection seeming as intimate and complete as their union below. As his kisses sank back to her breasts, turning their crests visibly wet beneath the moonlight, he said, "Sex might not always be about comin' for you, beb, but this time it is."

"How can you tell?"

He met her gaze, his dark eyes heavy-lidded with passion. "The way you move on me. I can feel you settin' the pace, pickin' the rhythm, makin' it happen."

He was right. She was only amazed that he could feel the subtle difference of the way she brought their bodies together, that sensual grind that was indeed lifting her to new heights.

She thrust harder, felt him deeper, moved closer to that delectable precipice that meant ecstasy was a heartbeat away. Old words from the past came echoing back. Let me have you. Well, she was letting him now. Giving him every ounce of her. This, she thought, was dirty dancing. The dirtiest, sexiest dance two people could do. Except that nothing with Jake was dirty. Nothing.

The climax ripped through her hot and merciless, a pleasure so intense it was almost painful, a jagged ride that made her cling to him tight, made her breath tremble as she moaned—until she drooped limp and listless in his arms.

She bent her head to his shoulder. Felt his hands resting at her hips and his breath in her ear. "Are you okay, beb?"

"Mmm," she said. It was all she could muster for a moment. "That was just... intense."

"I know," he replied, "and if I move a muscle, I'll come, too."

She wanted that more than anything else. "Oh, come in me.

"Ça c'est bon," he murmured just before thrusting deep inside her, nearly lifting her from his lap, a huge groan rising from within. She watched his eyes shut, watched his face clench, and reveled in making it happen.

"Ça c'est bon," he said again, more quietly now, going still, touching his forehead to hers. "So good."

His eyes stayed closed, so she knew he couldn't see her smile, but she'd gotten what she'd wanted when she'd decided to venture out to the bayou tonight. She'd simply longed to make him happy. And she couldn't fathom feeling more for someone than she felt for Jake right now.

The next morning, Jake eased out of bed without waking Stephanie, pulled on his jeans, and made his way to the kitchen.

Given that the house wasn't in any pizza delivery zones and that a quickie mart didn't lie a block away, he'd been forced to keep more food in than he did at home, so he nosed around for some breakfast.

Cracking some eggs into a bowl, he sniffed at a milk jug, decided it was still good, and poured some in. Firing up his grandmother's old gas stove, he set one of her well-used frying pans on top and emptied in some frozen sausage links he'd found in the freezer. Heating another skillet, he poured in the egg mixture and stirred to make them fluffy. Odd, just standing there at the stove for the first time in a while made him think maybe he'd whip up one of Manière's specialties for Stephanie sometime soon, some shrimp gumbo or jambalaya.

"Mmm, breakfast."

He looked up to see a sleepy, tousled woman standing in the doorway in his T-shirt. He couldn't help liking when she did that—reached for his clothes to put on instead of hers—and at the moment, he didn't think he'd ever seen her look more beautiful. "Mmm is right," he said, arching one eyebrow.

Over breakfast at the old Formica table, they talked— about easy things: the bayou, the house, the condo she owned in Chicago, the job she was growing bored with. And about harder things: his worry over Shondra, hers over Tina.

He explained that homeless kids in New Orleans were screwed because they couldn't get a job without a birth certificate. But if Shondra found work, he was hoping to pull some strings among his connections to get what she needed.

He also broke down and told her about the last guy

Tony talked to who thought he might have seen Tina, but cautioned her she shouldn't get too excited. She told him her escort connection, Melody, had given her a list of places to check in the CBD and he promised he'd get them from her as soon as they headed back to the city. He'd planned to stay out here a couple of nights, but now he figured he'd follow her back today. The worry in her eyes when they discussed Tina dug into his heart, and wanting to make her smile, he promised her apple pie when they returned to the Quarter.

After they ate, Stephanie insisted on cleaning up— saying it was only fair since he'd cooked. He made the bed, then stepped out onto the dock to soak in the calm of the bayou before the sun rose too high and hot overhead.

A few minutes later, the door opened and she stepped out, still in his tee. He shook a teasing finger at her. "I've got a feelin' you're traipsin' around without underwear again, young lady."

"Guilty as charged, officer."

He grinned. 'Take the shirt off and show me."

Her eyes flew wide. "What?"

"Take it off. I want to see you by the light of day,

chère."

"It's the light of day that makes it a little more difficult."

"Nobody out here but me and Mr. Cocodrie. And he won't tell." He winked.

She looked around, out over the water. "What if a boat comes by?"

He shrugged. "Possible, but not likely."

She stood in place, her eyes twinkling with temptation, but didn't move.

He flashed his most persuasive smile. "Where's my wild woman? Where's my animal?"

She glanced down at herself. "Under the shirt."

He let his smile fade. "Take it off."

He watched his wild Miss Stephanie send a long glance up and down the bayou, then turn her gaze back on him before she pulled the tee off over her head. Just like last night, he felt sucked into a dream—his mystery woman in the bayou. Only then he couldn't see her. Now he could.

"Come here, chère. I've got somethin' for ya."

She moved on long, lithe legs until she stood in front of him. "What's that?" she whispered.

He answered by drawing her onto the glider to straddle him, but this time he urged her up onto her knees and he sank down in the seat to make wild, hungry love to her with his mouth.

Soon enough, he was telling her he had something else for her, down lower, and she descended eagerly onto his stiffness, leaving him to revel in her rhythmic movements, in her naked beauty, in everything about her, everything she became in his arms.

This was the woman he dreamed about. This was the woman who'd come into Sophia's looking ready to seduce. This wasn't the Stephanie who wanted but pulled away, who yearned but turned afraid. He hoped never to see that woman again. This was the woman he wanted to keep.