It Must Be Love

'Sam loves Joe-braack.'

'No.'

Sam blinked his yellow-and-black eyes, raised his beak, and mimicked the telephone ringing.

'I haven't fallen for that in months.' Joe speared some macaroni with his fork and felt like he was taunting a two-year-old with an ice cream cone. 'The vet said you need to eat less and exercise more or you'll get liver disease.'

The bird flew to his shoulder, then rested his feathery head against Joe's ear. 'Pretty bird.'

'You're fat.' He remained strong during dinner and didn't feed Sam, but when the bird mimicked one of Joe's favorite phrases from a Clint Eastwood movie, he relented and fed him bites of Ann Cameron's cheesecake. It was as good as she'd claimed, so he guessed he owed her coffee. He tried to remember Ann as a kid, and vaguely recalled a girl with wire glasses sitting on one of those emerald green crushed velvet couches at her parents' house, staring at him while he'd waited for her sister, Sherry. She'd probably been about ten, six years younger than him. About Gabrielle's age.

The thought of Gabrielle brought a dull ache to his brow. Joe pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and middle finger and racked his brain to figure out what to do about her. He didn't have a clue.

As the setting sun washed the valley in twilight, Joe put Sam in his aviary and plugged Dirty Harry into the VCR. Besides Jerry Springer's Too Hot For Television, it was about the only tape Sam liked. In the past, Joe had tried to encourage his bird to watch Disney or Sesame Street or one of the educational tapes he'd bought. But Sam was a Jerry junkie, and like most parents, Joe gave in a lot.

He drove to the small brick house across town and parked his Bronco next to the curb. A pink porch light glowed above the front door. A few nights ago, the bulb had been green. Joe wondered at the significance but figured he probably didn't want to know.

A pair of squirrels darted across the lawn and sidewalk and skittered up the rough bark of an ancient oak. Halfway up, they paused to glare at him, the ends of their bushy tails snapped. Their agitated chatter filled his ears, reaming him as if somehow he'd been rude enough to steal their stash. He liked squirrels even less than cats.

Joe pounded on Gabrielle's door three times before it swung open. She stood before him wearing a big white shirt that buttoned up the front. Her green eyes widened, and her face flushed a deep red.

'Joe! What are you doing here?'

Before he answered her question, he let his gaze take her in, from the auburn curls falling from the ponytail on top of her head, to the string of beaded hemp tied around her ankle. She'd rolled the sleeves of her shirt up her forearms while the tails hit her about an inch above her bare knees. As far as he could see, she wore little else except multicolored paint smudges. 'I need to talk to you,' he said, returning his gaze to the increasing flush in her cheeks.

'Now?' She glanced behind her as if he'd caught her in the middle of doing something illegal.

'Yeah, what are you up to?'

'Nothing!' She looked guilty as hell about something.

'The other night I talked to you about interfering in the investigation, but just in case you didn't understand me, I'll tell you again. Quit protecting Kevin.'

'I'm not.' The light behind her got caught in her hair and shone through the white shirt, outlining her full breasts and slim hips.

'You declined an invitation to his party tomorrow night. I accepted for us.'

'I don't want to go. Kevin and I are friends and business partners, but we don't socialize. I've always thought it was best if we don't spend our time away from work together.'

'Too bad.' Joe waited for her to invite him inside, but she didn't. Instead, she folded her arms, drawing his attention to the black smear across her left breast.

'Kevin's friends are superficial. We won't have a good time.'

'We're not going there to have a good time.'

'You're going to search for the Monet, aren't you?'

'Yes.'

'Fine, but no more kissing.'

He rocked back on his heels and looked at her from beneath lowered lids. Her request was perfectly reasonable and irritated more than he would ever admit. 'I told you not to take it personal.'

'I'm not, but I don't like it.'

'You don't like what? Kissing me or not taking it personal?'

'Kissing you.'

'Bull, you get all warm and breathless.'

'You're mistaken.'

He shook his head and said through a smile, 'I don't think so.'

She sighed. 'Is that all you wanted, Detective?'

'I'll pick you up at eight.' He turned to leave, but looked back at her over his shoulder. 'And Gabrielle?'

'What?'

'Wear something sexy.'

Gabrielle shut the door and leaned her back against it. She felt light-headed and queasy, as if she'd conjured up Joe somehow. She took a deep breath and placed a hand over her racing heart. His showing up on her porch at that exact moment in time was some sort of freakish fluke.

Ever since he'd walked away from her booth that afternoon, she'd had an overwhelming desire to paint him again. This time standing within his red aura. Naked. After she'd returned home from a successful day at the Coeur Festival, she'd immediately walked into her studio and prepared a canvas. She'd sketched and painted his face and the hard muscles of his body. With visions of Michelangelo's David for inspiration, she'd just started to paint Joe's parts when he'd knocked. She'd opened the door and seen him standing there, and for several anxious moments she'd feared he somehow knew what she'd been up to. She'd felt guilty, like he'd caught her peeking at him without his clothes on.

She didn't believe in fate. She believed too strongly in free will, but she couldn't ignore the feeling of foreboding raising the hair on the back of her neck.

Gabrielle pushed away from the door and headed to her studio. She'd meant what she'd told Joe, no more kisses. While she found lying to him easier than she would have imagined a week ago, she couldn't lie to herself. For reasons she could not begin to fathom, standing so close to Joe, his breath whispering across her cheek and his lips brushing her mouth wasn't all that unpleasant. No, it wasn't unpleasant at all.

Gabrielle believed in expressing love honestly and openly, but not in a crowded park, and not with Detective Joe Shanahan. He didn't care for her, and he'd made it real clear that he considered kissing her part of his job. She'd thought about her reaction to his kiss and had come to the logical conclusion that Joe's touch messed up her biorhythm and threw everything out of whack. Kind of a hiccup or a glitch in the life energy connecting her body, mind, and spirit.

If Kevin walked in on them arguing again, or if Joe saw anyone from his past, he was going to have to figure out something else. No more standing close, filling her senses with the scent of his skin. No more impersonal kisses that reached inside and stole her breath away. And there was absolutely no way she was going to dress in 'something sexy' for him.

When the doorbell rang the next evening, Gabrielle thought she was ready for Joe this time. No more surprises. She was in control and if he'd been dressed in worn jeans and a T-shirt, she might have managed it, too. But one look at him and her peaceful center spun off into the cosmos somewhere.

He'd shaved his five o'clock shadow, and his tan cheeks were smooth. His ribbed black polo was made of silk and fit nicely across his wide chest and flat stomach. He'd slipped a woven leather belt through the loops of pleated gabardine pants with razor-sharp creases. Instead of old running shoes or work boots, he wore suede penny loafers. He smelled wonderful and looked better.

Unlike Joe, Gabrielle had purposely put less effort into her appearance. She'd dressed strictly for comfort in a plain white blouse and a shapeless blue-and-white checkered bib jumper that hit her just above the knee. She wore very little makeup and hadn't attempted to do anything different with her hair, just let it curl about her shoulders