Ghost Hunter

him over her shoulder. 'Are you sure you're all right?'

He looked grimly amused. 'Don't worry, I'm not going to lose control and climb all over you. I just summoned a little stray blue and green energy tonight. Didn't even melt amber.'

She glowered. 'I wasn't thinking about sex.'

'Huh. I must have been the one thinking about it, then.'

'Enough with the teasing, Boone.' She went on up the stairs and into the kitchen, put Rose on the floor, and reached for the kettle. 'This isn't the time.'

'Whatever.' He opened the refrigerator and took out the half-empty bottle of white.

'Herschel, one of the local neighborhood ruin rats, mentioned that Griggs occasionally hired a freelance team to take him down into the catacombs,' she added. 'Now I know why. Griggs was looking for Jordan's Jungle.'

'Tomorrow I'm going to chase down more information on the florist. He's the key to this thing.'

She spooned the tea into a mug. 'A dead key, unfortunately.'

'Okay, I admit that's a problem.' Cooper grabbed a glass out of a cupboard and sat down at the kitchen table. 'But we've got a couple of other angles to work here.'

'Such as?'

'I'm still waiting for another shoe to drop at The Road to the Ruins. Now that Griggs is dead, I don't think it will be too much longer before we find out what our blue freak had planned for that stash of dope he hid in the club's basement'

The kettle whistled. She picked it up and was not surprised to see it tremble a little in her hand. She poured the hot water quickly into the mug.

Rose hopped up onto the windowsill and hunkered down beside the green flower. Cooper took a long swallow of the wine and watched the dust bunny.

'I guess things haven't gone quite the way you planned since you arrived in Cadence, have they?' Elly asked, carrying her mug back to the table.

'No.' He drank more wine and lowered the glass with a reflective air. 'They haven't.'

He did not offer anything more.

'What about your other business?' she pressed cautiously.

He looked at her. 'Other business?'

'The business that brought you here in the first place.' She motioned with one hand. 'You know, the private business you said you had here in Cadence.'

'Oh, that.' He exhaled slowly. 'Well, I hope to get around to that eventually.'

She blew on her hot tea. 'Cooper?'

'Yeah?'

'Mind if I ask you a personal question?'

'Depends on the question.'

'I just wondered if the reason you haven't had a relationship with anyone else in the past six months is because you were too busy.'

He raised his brows. 'Here's a flash for you, Elly. Men who like sex are never too busy to have it. Where there's a will, there's always a way.'

'I see. You like sex.'

'Oh, yeah.'

'So, why haven't you had any for the past six months?' she asked.

'Eight months, five days,' he corrected. 'And the answer is that I didn't consider our engagement terminated.'

'I don't understand. I gave you back your ring. What was your interpretation of that move?'

'Figured we'd just put things on hold for a while. I thought if you had some time away from Aurora Springs and all the pressures of your situation there, you might change your mind about marrying me.'

'I see.'

No 'I love you desperately and I can't live without you,' or 'Please come back to me; I'll do anything including give up my job as a Guild boss for you,' she thought.

Cooper was still locked into his fully focused executive mode. At the age of nine he had set out to become the chief of the Aurora Springs Guild, and he had stayed on track until he had achieved his objective. Eight months and five days ago, he had concluded that she would make the perfect wife for the head of the Aurora Springs Guild, and he was still pursuing his objective.

'I've got a question for you,' he said.

'What is it?'

'I get the feeling that you haven't gone to bed with anyone else during the time we've been apart.'

'I've been awfully busy,' she said quickly. 'Running a small business is extremely time-consuming.'

'Try again.'

She put her mug down, got to her feet, and went to stand at the window. Maybe it was all they had been through together in the past few days. Or maybe it was late and she was weary and her guard was down.

Or maybe it was because he hadn't slept with anyone else since she had left Aurora Springs.

Whatever the reason, she decided to tell him the truth.

'Ever since the day I met you, I haven't wanted to go to bed with anyone else,' she said quietly. 'But in Aurora Springs you didn't seem all that interested. And lately, well, you haven't been around.'

There was no sound, but suddenly he was behind her, his hands resting on her shoulders.

'I'm here now,' he said.

She caught her breath and turned to face him, her hands flattening on his shoulders.

'Cooper.'

He kissed her, taking his time about it. She closed her eyes beneath the waves of emotion that swept through her.

She was vaguely aware of him reaching around her to pull down the window shade. The next thing she knew he had picked her up in his arms and was carrying her out of the kitchen.

She heard him de-rez the light switches as they went down the hall, allowing the small apartment to fill with intimate shadows.

The drapes were open in the bedroom. The reflected glow of the green-tinged fog illuminated the bed in an otherworldly aura.

Cooper stood her on her feet and used his powerful hands to angle her face so that he could kiss her again. There was no mistaking the force of his desire. It thrilled her senses. Maybe he didn't love her, but without a doubt, he wanted her.

All the midnight dreams and fantasies that she had tried so hard to ignore, resist, and suppress were springing to life with a vengeance.

He caught the hem of her pullover and eased the garment up over her head. The instant her arms were free, she wrapped them around his neck.

'Cooper,' she repeated very urgently.

'No,' he whispered. 'Not so fast. Not this time. Don't get me wrong, the car sex was terrific, but it wasn't what I'd had planned for our first night together. I'd like to get it right tonight.'

She tilted her head back so that she could see his face. 'Wait a second. You planned our first time?'

'Sure.' He found the fastening of her small, satiny bra and slipped the straps off her shoulders. 'Until the day you gave me back my ring I had every move in our relationship planned down to the smallest detail.'

'Good grief.' She gripped his shoulders, holding him inches away from her. 'And just when did you do all this detailed planning?'

He kissed her ear. 'Started that first day when you came into the Guild Archives to see if your father was there. I had started working there the week before. It was the first time I'd met you.'

He was cupping her breasts in his warm palms now. She shivered when his thumbs glided across her nipples.