When She Was Bad...

The more rational side of his mind told him, no, she was up to something. But his body paid no attention to his brain. He was already stepping closer so that their bodies were nearly touching.

A shiver moved through her, but it wasn’t fear he saw in her eyes. It was a mix of desire and nerves, almost exactly what he was feeling. But still he hesitated. This was what he’d come for, but the rational side of his brain reminded him that nothing that came this easily could be trusted.

“Don’t you want to kiss me?” Pepper didn’t wait for his answer. Instead, she closed the little distance that was left between them, placed her hands on his shoulders and rose onto her tiptoes. It was her scent that hit him first, something that reminded him of hot tropical nights. Her wide, amber-colored eyes were the next thing that registered in the rational part of his mind. When he dropped his gaze to her mouth, his rational mind began to shut down. Her lips were parted, moist, waiting…

But what little was left of his brain was still suspicious. The Pepper he’d come to know in the last few months was wary of him. This woman was…Suddenly it clicked. She was playing a role.

“Who are you pretending to be?” he asked.

“What?” Her eyes widened and became wary.

Bingo. “You’re pretending to be someone else, and I want to know who I’m kissing.”

She met his eyes steadily. “I was going for Angelina Jolie. I figured she might be your type.”

The corners of his mouth curved. He reached out and gently rubbed his thumb over her bottom lip. So lush. “Not even close. I’ve never had a fantasy about kissing her. What if I told you I came back here just to kiss you? That I’ve been dreaming of kissing you since you dropped that bowl of pasta?”

Her breath hitched and surprise now mixed with the desire he saw in her eyes. Satisfied, he framed her face with his hands. In some part of his mind, he registered that her skin was even softer and her hair even silkier than he’d dreamed. But all of his attention was on her mouth.

Leaning down, he brushed his lips against hers. It wasn’t a kiss, just the barest pressure of his mouth to hers, yet his blood began to pound in his head.

When he drew back, she moistened her lips with her tongue as if she hadn’t gotten enough of his taste. Heat shot through him. He wanted more of her too. Unable to resist, he sampled her lower lip with his tongue, then drew it into his mouth and nipped it. Pleasure clouded her eyes and her pulse quickened beneath his thumb at her temple.

Hunger for her rose with a speed that shocked him. He was just going to kiss her, he reminded himself. They were here on a job. But he only had to press his mouth to hers again for his intention to change. One more taste was all it took, and without another thought, he plunged them both deeper.

He wasn’t a man who particularly liked surprises, but this seemed to be his night for them. He’d thought he’d known what she would taste like, but her flavor was more sinfully sweet than he’d anticipated. The deeper he probed, the darker and richer it grew. Her response was unexpected too. Her nails dug into his shoulders, and her mouth was as greedy, as avid, as his. He’d sensed the passion held in check beneath that pressed and polished exterior, but this was more. She was more than he’d anticipated. He only had to cup her bottom with his hands and she scooted up, wrapping her arms and legs around him.

What astonished him most was his response to her. He’d never been so aware of a woman before—the press of that small, strong body against his and the husky sound of her voice when she said his name triggered explosions of pleasure that went far beyond any fantasy he’d been able to conjure up. His blood had burned before but never quite like this. And control—he never lost it—never. But he could feel it slipping as surely as he could feel the synapses disconnecting in his brain. When she arched against him and began to rub against his hardness, something inside him snapped.

One thought streamed through him. He wanted her and he could have her. Now. The certainty of that, the power of it, shot through him and he moved toward the bedroom. Once he had her pressed against the door, his hands began to move of their own accord, unfastening her slacks and his own. When he’d finally dragged hers off, some dim corner of his mind cleared enough to remember the Monet, the job.

“The painting,” he murmured as he lifted her again. “We’ll finish this in the bedroom where the Monet is.”

He lifted her again and opened the door. But he didn’t step over the threshold. Even in the darkness of the room’s interior, he could see that the easel was empty and the door to the balcony stood open.

As his blood cooled and his mind cleared, Cole was pretty sure of one thing. He was holding the thief’s accomplice in his arms.

1

Friday, February 13—12 p.m.

PEPPER SCANNED EscapadeIsland’s small airport, but the miracle she’d been praying for didn’t occur. There was no sign of Irene or the Monet. As per usual, her plan to become Pepper Rossi, super sleuth, was not going well.

This time she couldn’t in all conscience lay the blame at Cole Buchanan’s feet. If she’d been distracted during the past few days because she couldn’t pry him loose from her thoughts, she had no one to blame but herself. She’d started what had happened in the penthouse suite. She’d acted, as usual, on impulse and gotten in way over her head. Acting without thinking things through was a flaw that her grandmother Pendleton had initially pointed out to her when she was about four. And Pepper knew the accompanying lecture by heart. Trouble was, she mostly ignored it, so she’d been a constant disappointment to her grandmother. The end result was that she’d left Chicago. Moving to San Francisco was a golden opportunity to start fresh and to finally fit in with a family. But now the same thing was threatening to happen with the Rossis. She was screwing up, and she couldn’t seem to fit in with them either.

And kissing Cole Buchanan hadn’t been her only impulsive act two nights ago. She’d also helped her aunt steal a priceless Monet. And now she’d lost track of both.

“Please, God.” She repeated the prayer that she’d been sending up on a regular basis during the commuter flight to EscapadeIsland. “I promise, if you’ll just let me find Irene and recover the Monet, I’ll never do another impulsive thing in my life. Really.”

Quickening her pace, she threaded her way through her fellow deplaning passengers, trying to ignore the headache that pounded at full throttle behind her eyes. Tailing people had been one of her strengths in the PI course she’d taken. Still, she’d lost Irene in the crowd at the Miami airport. She hadn’t panicked because she figured that her aunt would eventually board the connecting flight to EscapadeIsland. But it was a tall man, speaking with a French accent, wearing a beret and sporting a goatee, who’d taken the final empty seat just before takeoff.

Pepper skidded to a stop and barely missed crashing into the couple in front of her. They’d stopped to embrace. She wasn’t sure if it was the clinch or the fact that they were wearing long trench coats, but several other people had slowed down or stopped to watch them. This close, she could see that they were older than they’d seemed at a distance—in their seventies, she figured. Well, more power to them, she thought as she dodged to her left and sped around the small crowd that was gathering.

She had to figure out why Irene had missed the flight. Her first thought was that her aunt had spotted her in the Miami airport and changed her plans. But that didn’t make sense. First of all, Pepper had disguised herself in a blond wig and jeans. Irene had never seen her in either. Ladies never wore jeans. Grandmother Pendleton had drilled that into her at a very early age. And jeans had been forbidden at the exclusive boarding school she’d been sent to for high school. It had been part of her grandmother’s attempt to turn her into a lady like her mother, but it hadn’t exactly paid off.

Pepper wished that she could remember her mother. All she really had to go on were the stories that her grandmother had told her of how perfectly her mother had always acted in any situation. So far, she hadn’t had the courage to pump her brothers or her father about her mother. She would—once she felt more comfortable around them…once she fit in.

Glancing up, Pepper caught her reflection in the glass wall that ran the length of the airport. Except for the strappy red high-heeled sandals, she barely recognized herself. The thin gold hoops at her ears had been a last-minute addition to the disguise. According to her grandmother, a true lady wore studs. The Jackie O sunglasses and a small black duffel she’d slung over her shoulder completed the outfit. She barely recognized herself, so there was no way that Irene had “made” her.

But even if she had, her aunt wouldn’t have changed her plans. In the letters that her aunt had sent her over the years, Pepper had come to know her pretty well. And she’d come to admire the fact that once Irene had a goal, she went after it full throttle. That was how Irene had gotten her own TV show. And when the ratings had dropped during the first season, Irene had broken into the mayor’s mansion to prove that even the “best” security system had its flaws. If Irene was hell-bent on giving the Monet to Butch Castellano on Valentine’s Day, which was tomorrow, she’d let nothing and no one stand in her way.