Jinxed!

out.

Of course she didn’t, she continued to fight him with everything she had, and then some.

“I know it’s you!” she cried. “Why are we handcuffed?”

Another most excellent question, which begged yet another, which was…just who didn’t he trust, her…or him?

“Just tell me why you won’t admit it’s you!”

Yes. Why didn’t he just admit it was him? Simple. Acknowledging their connection would jeopardize his case, not to mention his equilibrium.

Chloe. After all these years. Soft, beautiful, giving, passionate, wonderful Chloe. His first lover, keeper of his heart and, truthfully…

His biggest mistake.

God, he’d been so lost at eighteen, so sure he’d needed to leave town to make something of himself. And not just leave town, but go all the way across the country.

That’s what came of growing up in an unhappy household.

But he’d learned a lot since then-such as, happiness came from within, not from a job or a location.

He’d been happy enough in New York, and after college had been recruited by the FBI as a stolen-antiquity specialist. But he’d been happier when he’d come back to Los Angeles.

He could smell her, some intoxicating scent, and he wanted to bury his face in her hair like a homecoming, because God, this was Chloe. He’d been with women since her, and he’d even had a connection with some of those women, but nothing like he’d had with her.

Hell, even tonight, when he’d seen her across the grass and courtyard, he’d felt the pull of her, had been helpless against it. Now, here, being this close felt more essential than breathing.

And that was a problem, a big one.

“Say something!” she demanded, still wriggling like crazy. “Goddamnit, say something, anything!”

He’d been trying to restrain her before she made him a eunuch but something in her voice stopped him cold. He was scaring her. Torn between losing his cover and the need to make sure he didn’t give her a heart attack, he leaned over her and pressed his forehead to the wall, squeezing his eyes shut, his mind whirling. “I’ll tell you what’s going on, but you have to be still and quiet. Okay?”

She was breathing like a misused race horse, her soft warm exhales brushing his jaw.

“Okay?” he repeated, his hands gentle on her.

Still panting, he felt her nod. A strand of her hair caught on the day-old growth on his jaw and stubbornly clung. Another stray piece of silk stabbed him in the eyes.

Torture.

He waited a moment to make sure she was really going to behave because she’d nearly kicked his balls into next week, and, as he was particularly fond of all his parts, he didn’t want a repeat.

She didn’t move.

He’d thought that’s what he wanted but it turned out, no. Because now everything that had been moving before was still, giving him a much better grip on her.

And with the grip he had, combined with the blackness all around them, every little thing was magnified.

Intensified.

She was everything he remembered, everything that got into his dreams sometimes late at night: smart, gorgeous and tenacious as hell. God, he’d be so happy to see her, his first lover, the girl who’d once completely stolen his heart. Happy, except for two reasons.

One, he was deep into this stolen antiquities case. And two, as the accountant for his suspect, Chloe had some serious explaining to do. “I’m going to try to find my flashlight,” he said.

“It’s in your pants.”

No, what was in his pants was a hard-on to rival all hard-ons. “Actually…”

She’d been holding herself rigid, but now she gave new meaning to the phrase still as stone, and he grimaced. “It’s on the floor. Bend with me to reach for it.” Without waiting for her to protest or decide to try to unman him again, he hunkered and forced her down with him. He had his free hand on her belly, which he could feel quivering. His other hand-attached to hers by the wrist-reached out to feel around the floor. Bent as they were, with her practically in his lap, the position became unintentionally erotic.

Or maybe not so unintentionally.

He couldn’t seem to help himself. Feeling like a pervert, he gritted his teeth and felt around for the light, finally grabbing it. When he straightened, she did as well, and this time, she turned, facing him within the tight circle of his body and the wall now at her back.

He held up the light, and she drew a steadying breath. “It’s you. I know it.”

Damn it. He lowered the light to their sides. He had to be careful here, very careful. When he’d taken this case, he’d had no idea that she was involved in any way. When he’d first seen her name, he’d hoped it’d been another Chloe Cooper.

“I know it’s you,” she said softly in the dark. “Say it’s you or I’m going to-”

He felt the shift of her weight and knew she was going to try to kick him again. To avoid that he sandwiched her between the wall and his body, chest to chest this time, thighs to thighs…and unfortunately, everything in between.

At that, all professionalism packed up and left him. He needed to back away, needed to put some space between them, but that was damn hard when all he wanted to do was grab her close, kiss her blind and push up into her body.

Yeah, that was professional at its finest. He struggled to get it together and, lacking that ability, simply tried to locate some working brain cells.

“Ian-” Accompanying her soft plea, her free hand came up, sinking into his hair, tugging his head down, and then…oh, God, and then…she kissed him.

And it was like coming home.

Yeah, way to back away there, champ. But she was kissing him, letting out a soft little sexy-as-hell murmur from deep in her throat, her body moving against his, her hands clutching at him, all lush and warm and needy female.

Ah, God, it was good. So good he was already trembling, his breath trapped in his throat the way all his blood was now trapped behind his button fly.

Get it together.

He didn’t. Well, except to better line up their lips. Not his smartest decision, but his brain was truly no longer in control. The feel of her lips sent waves of heat and hunger and a barely repressed longing he hadn’t realized he still felt, all of it colliding within him, surprising him with its force so that he shook with it. “Wait,” he gasped.

She didn’t. Of course she didn’t. Instead she nibbled first one corner of his mouth and then the other, while inside him the heat burst into flame. Stop, he ordered himself, but that was far more difficult then he’d imagined, and he kept kissing her for another minute, lightly, softly now, trying like hell to let them both down easy. “We have to stop,” he whispered.

Her answer to that was to run the tip of her tongue along his lower lip.

Unable to control himself, he sucked it right into his mouth. Oh, yeah. God. This was crazy.

Crazy.

She was driving him right out of his mind with that heart-stopping mouth of hers, and he let out a dark, shockingly needy sound that would have destroyed him if he hadn’t sensed she felt the same way. He told himself to back away, but he didn’t.

He wasn’t sure what kind of fool that made him, but then she cupped his face and took that sweet tongue of hers on a tour of his and that was it, he was one, two, three, down for the count. Helplessly drowning in her and not caring, he went to band his arms around her, but came up against the barrier of his own handcuffs.

Shit.

How he’d nearly forgotten was beyond him. He slipped his free hand around her, low on her spine, so that he could haul her up against him. His other hand, the one linked to hers, he drew up over her head, against the wall, holding it there as he let the kiss take him.