Secretive Stranger

trouble, any kind of trouble…so this whole mess had to be her worst nightmare.

Her revealing the business about her nest egg showed that she trusted him-was risking her trust on him.

That alone revealed her innocence to him, in both senses of the word. The more he knew her, the more time he spent with her, the more beautiful he could see she was. The wrong kind of beauty. The dangerous kind of beauty. The true-blue vulnerability in her eyes was the kind that could attract the worst predators. And Cord sure as hell couldn’t be the only man who saw beneath the silly clothes and glasses to the Sophie underneath.

Impatiently, he said, “Come on, Soph. There has to be something else.”

This conversation was getting nowhere-at least not in the direction it was supposed to go. The more Cord believed in Sophie’s innocence, the more he realized that the guilty party, the one who murdered his brother, was still out there free. And Sophie was a stop sign in the way.

Sophie shrugged her shoulders. “You keep saying there has to be something else. But I’ve told you all the something elses I can think of, Cord.”

He tugged at the collar of her jacket when he caught her shivering. “When the police looked into Jon’s death, they were uneasy about some loose ends. They had the impression Jon was hiding something.”

“You mean drugs?”

“Not drugs. But something that explains all the trap doors and hidey-holes and locked gadgets in his apartment. I don’t have the whole picture,” he said, with complete honesty. “But I’m getting enough to be…worried. And now someone’s ransacked your place.”

She shook her head in bewilderment. “You’re making it sound as if you believe there’s a connection.”

Cord had had it with juggling what he could tell her and what he couldn’t. Maybe he couldn’t tell her the authorities’ “truth.” But he could sure as hell choose to share his own. “I believe my brother was involved in something unsavory. Even as a kid, he was always looking for ways to make a buck without having to do anything as annoying as real work. The way this appears, I think Jon had information about certain important people. Affairs, mistakes-that kind of thing. I don’t know who or what. But I believe his ‘victims’ want that information back, and are particularly worried what happened to it since Jon died.”

Sophie gulped down more wine and held out her paper cup. “No matter what the police said, you don’t think your brother’s death was an accident, do you?”

“Nope. I don’t.”

She waggled her cup. “More wine.”

“Don’t you think you’ve had quite a bit?”

“Not if we’re going to talk about murder.”

He filled her cup again and quit arguing.

Chapter 5

Amazing what a little wine and food could do. Granted, she was seeing streetlights in triplicate and her head felt a little woozy…but she wasn’t scared anymore.

She was mad.

“I never get mad,” she told Cord.

“So you’ve mentioned, several times.”

“It’s an amazing relief. Instead of feeling scared, to just let go and feel mad. I mean, what is this?” She waved her arms to illustrate. “I’ve had enough rotten stuff to deal with. Getting broken into is just ridiculously unfair. Finding your dead brother was even worse. I mean, maybe your brother wasn’t the most ethical knife in the drawer, but…” She frowned, not certain if she was making sense. Although that didn’t seem to stop her from talking. “I’m going to get regularly mad from now on. Loud mad. Mean mad. It’s so much better than being scared. When I was a little girl, I used to stand on the porch and sing at the top of my lungs, did you know that? I was a brat. A ham. An attention grabber. It took years, years, to turn me into the pissy, button-down fuddy-duddy I am today…Oh God, did I say pissy? I meant prissy. I would never say prissy…I mean pissy…oh, shoot, which one did I mean?”

“Sophie, let’s wait until the car stops before you get out, cookie.”

“And then there’s you,” she muttered. Fresh air slapped her in the face when she climbed out of the car. Good thing, since the whole street was revolving like a carousel. Suddenly, she wondered why she didn’t drink more often. This was so wonderful. The whole night looked magically sprinkled with stardust.

“Sophie?”

“No,” she said firmly, and abruptly danced down the street. Cord did that to her. Made her feel like dancing. Made her think about moonlight and stardust. It was…unsettling. Somewhere beneath the taste of all that wine was the taste of temptation. Not the temptation of stardust, but the temptation of plain old lust. No man had tempted her in years-not really tempted-the kind of temptation that made her want to strip off more than clothes. The kind of temptation to throw all her fears to the wind and just grab hold of him for the lust of it.

“Oh, no,” she muttered. “I learned a long time ago that monsters don’t hide under the bed. They’re everywhere. At least my monsters are. You can’t feel safe if you think someone’s going to disappear on you. And they all do. Everyone does. So, for darn sure, you don’t open the door to someone you’re not sure of. And for damn sure, I’m not sure of you.”

Abruptly, she found Cord standing directly in front of her. “I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about, Soph, but your apartment is that way.” He motioned behind her.

“Well, hell. Who moved my building?” she demanded.

If he answered her, she couldn’t hear him-possibly because her right ear was abruptly crushed against his chest. His long arm tucked her against his side as he turned her around, steering her toward the brownstone. She’d have protested, but the truth was that she’d have stumbled if he hadn’t helped hold her up.

Still, she felt the situation needed clarifying. “Look,” she said, “I don’t do this. Ever.”

“Don’t do what?”

“I don’t fall in love with men who aren’t honest with me. Cripes, it’s hard enough for me to loosen up with men who are honest with me. You’re too far off my radar, Cord. There’s no reason you’d normally be looking at me. So something isn’t kosher. I feel it. I know it. So that’s it. I’m not falling in love with you. It’d be like getting a love note from a pistachio.”

“Huh?”

“You don’t know the pistachio song? You want me to sing it?”

“No. Please God, no. Sophie, just concentrate on walking, okay?”

“Or I could sing the other song, about walking on the safe side of the sidewalk. About how she’s afraid to trust anyone, even herself. That’s me. The untruster. The safe sidewalk walker.” She repeated that phrase, charmed with herself. All those S’s and W’s. And she said them brilliantly. Several times.

Out of the complete blue, Cord suddenly lifted her in his arms.

“What-”

“Shh. No more talking for you.”

Well, the truth was, she was pretty darned exhausted. So she closed her eyes for just a second, thinking she just needed a moment to catch her breath.

Just before opening her eyes, Sophie felt the snuggly security of a warm, breathing body next to her. A male body. And so typical of a male who’d gotten exactly what he wanted, he was purring loud enough to wake the neighborhood. “Caviar, you know you’re not allowed under the covers…” Her groggy voice trailed off abruptly. Caviar didn’t seem to be the only male in her bedroom.

Cord looked downright silly, sprawled in her white wicker rocker with the flowery cushion. He’d taken off his shoes. His right sock had a hole. His hair looked raked by a tornado and his chin had sprouted a weed patch of whiskers.