Blackwolf's Redemption

You know why, a mocking voice inside him said. Just take her to bed and get it over with, then she’ll be out of your system.

He looked at Sienna, that surprised “Lieutenant?” still buzzing in his head.

“Sienna.” She turned toward him. “To answer your question,” he said coolly, “yes, I held the rank of lieutenant. And just to get it out of the way, yes, those were medals you saw on my uniform, including the Distinguished Service Cross. And yes, I know how to fly. I know how to do a lot of things, including not bothering with small talk. Am I being clear? Because, just in case you thought otherwise, work is the sole reason I brought you along.”

Her face turned pink. Her eyes flashed. She turned to the window but he saw her hands knot together in her lap.

You are a gold-plated bastard, Blackwolf, he told himself.

And a very bad liar.

He’d brought her with him because he wanted her near him. The sound of her laughter, the look of her, the way she stood up to him every time…

He wanted to get out of his seat, go to her and take her in his arms.

Instead, he dug in his pocket for a pen and a small, leather-bound notebook, opened it and began scribbling notes. That the notes were meaningless didn’t matter.

Keeping busy was everything.

The flight was smooth and took less than four hours.

Sienna had never been to San Francisco before, which meant she had no way of knowing if the skyline had changed much between Jesse’s day and hers. But the taxi ride from the airport had been a revelation. The city was big and busy, its roads crowded with old cars…except they weren’t old. Not really. And the way people were dressed, all those silly bell-bottom trousers and platform shoes…

It might have been amusing, but it wasn’t. It was, instead, a reminder—as if she needed one—that she had somehow slipped through time.

Don’t think about that, she told herself, don’t! Instead, she took refuge in a cool cynicism, as if what awaited her here was nothing out of the ordinary, starting with the moment the taxi pulled up before a glass-and-concrete tower on Russian Hill.

It was, she knew, some of the priciest real estate in the world.

She focused on keeping her face free of expression as they rode a private elevator to the penthouse floor, which turned out to be all Jesse’s. Huge rooms, high ceilings, acres of glass with views of the city in all directions, including the glorious Golden Gate Bridge.

His housekeeper had left a note. It was polite and brief. The refrigerator was fully stocked, there was a stir-fry of shrimp, bok choy and snow peas ready for heating. The bedrooms were all freshly made up, the bathrooms fully stocked with Mr. Blackwolf’s favorite supplies, though she advised against using the fourth bathroom because the tile work around the tub had not yet been completed.

Sienna looked up, an eyebrow raised. “The fourth bathroom? How many are there?”

“The four,” Jesse said with a gruffness that was either careless or embarrassed. She couldn’t be sure which. “And a half,” he added, and now there was no question about it, he was embarrassed. “I wanted the place for the view.”

“The view from the half bath?” she said sweetly.

“The apartment,” he said with a glare—and then, to her surprise, he laughed. “It’s kind of big, I admit.”

Big? It was almost the size of his house. Not that she cared one way or another. It was just that this was a long way from horses and canyons and Chevy trucks. How? she wanted to ask. Better still, why?

But she wasn’t about to ask him anything….

“Stocks,” he said brusquely. “I’m an investor. A trader.”

So much for cool cynicism. “Oh,” she said, and he laughed again, this time a real laugh, straight from his belly. His flat, hard belly…

“What? Can’t you think of me as an investor?”

Sienna swallowed dryly. What she’d been thinking about him didn’t have a thing to do with investments, and she was not going there! She raised her chin, gave him her best “Who cares?” look.

“Frankly, I wasn’t thinking of you at all. I was thinking which of those four-and-a-half bathrooms would be mine.”

“Pick a bedroom. They all come with bathrooms.” His mouth twitched. “Though you might want to avoid the one with the unfinished tile work.”

“The only bedroom I want to avoid is the one that belongs to you.”

She’d meant it as a cool statement of fact and saw, immediately, that Jesse had taken it as a challenge.

“Trust me, baby,” he said softly. “If I wanted you in my bedroom, you’d be there.”

She felt her face heat, knew she needed a flippant rejoinder, but her mind was blank so she made do with marching out of the room. She hadn’t gotten far when he called her name.