Jinxed!

the framing shop not letting her pass until she’d stopped and gone through a whole verse.

With a forced smile, she rushed through the motions, thinking she had not consumed enough alcohol for this. Finally she got around them and waved goodbye, walking backward two steps before she again plowed into someone.

A someone with a rock-hard chest. “Sorry,” she said, turning, looking up-

Her mouth fell open, because that hadn’t been just any rock-hard chest. “Ohmigod,” she said in an unintentionally breathless voice as his hands came up to steady her.

With his big, strong hands on her arms, and those warm, warm eyes locked on hers, it was like being catapulted back in time, so that she couldn’t help sounding like Marilyn Monroe there for a second.

She’d never been one to use her femininity purposely. In fact, she’d been a tomboy all her life, which her own athletic frame had made natural, and had only recently become more comfortable in dresses and makeup and all things associated with being female.

Secretly she was glad, because it meant she was wearing her flowing, flowery skirt, pretty and flattering. She just wished she didn’t sound as if she needed him to give her an orgasm. “My God, Ian. It’s amazing to see you. What are you doing here?”

“I’m sorry.” He spoke in the same low, slightly husky voice that had always turned her on so much. But something stopped her cold, and that was the fact that he also sounded like he was addressing a perfect stranger.

“Ian, it’s me. Chloe. Chloe Cooper.”

“Chloe.” He frowned, his expression serious, and also now carefully, completely blank. “I don’t-I think you’re confusing me with someone else.”

No way. But all the warmth had left his gaze, and now she couldn’t even be sure…had she imagined the initial recognition in his eyes? The air in her lungs deflated, along with any ego or pride she might have had, which, granted had, been slim to begin with.

He didn’t recognize her.

Embarrassed, she laughed a little. “High school. Junior and senior year…” She trailed off when he shook his head. Oh, God, he really didn’t remember her. “I’m sorry. I-Never mind.” Heart beating uncomfortably fast, she moved around him. Wow. She had no idea what had just happened, but it had been truly awkward. Definitely past time to get back up to her office, where she could put both this and Madame Karma’s silly predictions and subsequent curse right out of her head.

Damn, she wished she’d kept that bag of cookies, she thought as she walked away.

What else could she do?

But then…then something made her glance back. Maybe it’d been his scent, some mixture of soap and deodorant and all man, a scent that was so damn familiar she wanted to pinch herself and wake up.

Maybe it’d been the undeniable certainty that she wasn’t wrong.

Or maybe…maybe it was something much, much simpler. Such as the scar beneath his ear.

She remembered that Ian had a scar like that, too, from when he’d taken a flying header out of his dad’s truck the day he’d turned sixteen and had wrapped the vehicle around a telephone pole while attempting to find a good song on the radio and drive at the same time.

A scar that she’d once pressed her mouth to and kissed. He’d loved it when she’d done that, and in return, she’d loved the sound of his harshly indrawn breath from just feeling her lips on him.

Why didn’t he remember her? There had to be an explanation, she decided, and turned back. “Ian-”

He hadn’t moved, but seemed to stand frozen to the spot, looking at her. “I’m not Ian.”

His identical twin then. Only Ian hadn’t had a brother. In fact, after his dad had died in their senior year, he’d had nobody. She pointed to his scar. “You got that in your car accident, remember?”

“No.” Lifting a hand, he covered the scar. “You’re mistaken. You’re confusing me with someone else.”

“So you’re not Ian McCall.”

“You’re confusing me with someone else, that’s all.” He looked around him, at the party, the people, the pleasant chaos. “And I’m sorry, but I really need to get back to my…date.”

Okay, he wasn’t who she’d thought, and he also wasn’t available. She got it. But being this close made her body ache, which was a ridiculous phenomenon all in itself that she would worry about later. For now, she just couldn’t stop staring, just couldn’t get over the fact that she was wrong, that this man wasn’t Ian.

As she stood there somewhat in shock, the music changed, quickened, and there was a surge toward the dance floor. A group of people shifted behind the Ian-imposter, nudging him into her so that their bodies brushed.

Hers reacted immediately, as in nipples hardening, thighs tingling, the whole deal. And the bottom line was that her body recognized this man’s body.

Again she was bumped, and she nudged up close. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, putting her hands up to his chest to brace herself because it was getting extremely crowded around them.

And because she couldn’t help herself.

His hands went to her waist to steady them both, and in what undoubtedly was more of her overactive, sugar- induced imagination, he gently squeezed her hips, regret flashing in his eyes.

Regret, and…something. But it was gone so fast she couldn’t be sure she hadn’t made that up as well.

True love is going to walk into your life.

The words wouldn’t leave her brain. She’d laughed them off, but deep down she felt uneasy about the slight, very slight, possibility that she really did believe.

A fact she’d deny to her dying day, because even if this man was Ian, her once- upon-a-time teenage love, he couldn’t possibly be the love of her life now, all these years later.

That, she definitely did not believe. “I just can’t get over it,” she murmured. “You look so much like-”

“They say we all have a twin out there.”

“Yeah.” The music slowed again, and the lights dimmed. All around them people drifted into pairs as the slow dance began.

The two of them stood there, awkwardly staring at each other, not moving except for the constant bumping of the crowd.

“I should-” he started.

“Yeah. Me, too.”

He nodded. “Because I need to find…”

His date. Right.

And she should go upstairs.

Any moment now.

But neither of them moved. She, for one, didn’t want to, and she’d like to think he didn’t, either.

And then somehow they’d shifted even closer, her body flush against his again, as they sort of somehow fell into the rhythm of the music.

“I really need to go…” he started.

But he didn’t go. His face was almost fierce with intent as he looked at her, same as when he’d been in the middle of a basketball game, or about to kiss her…And unable to resist, she melted into him. She couldn’t help herself, he felt that good, that unbearably familiar.

Did he feel it?

She closed her eyes to let her body absorb the pleasure. It was as if time really had stopped, as if everything had stopped except this, and, helpless to the odd pull, she opened her eyes again and tipped her head up to say something, anything.

But she was interrupted by a startling flash of lightning, followed by an almost immediate crack of thunder that had her jerking nearly right out of her skin.

In reaction, he spread his fingers on her back and slid his hand up and down in a gesture that felt incredibly protective. Comforting.

And yet somehow so sexual she nearly purred.

And then the storm, which had been slowly moving in, finally arriving in all its glory. Around them, everyone gave a collective gasp and scattered off the dance floor, just as it began to rain.