A deep male voice interrupted her thoughts. “You know that I can hear every word you say…right?”
Startled, Frankie spun around and glared up at the man she’d vowed never to see again. He’d moved from the chair to the doorway of the rough office, leaning a shoulder against the frame of the door.
She looked into those eyes – silver, she realized – and noticed the dimple on his left cheek as he unsuccessfully tried to hide his amusement…and groaned, closing her eyes as she realized what she should have caught back in Dallas. And she might have, if she’d been in her right mind!
“No!” She stomped her foot, shook her head, and sighed. Reluctantly, she lifted her gaze to meet his. “Why did it have to be you?”
He chuckled and pushed away from the doorframe, walking towards her. “Well, that’s an interesting question.”
Frankie held her breath when he reached out and tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. Frankie still hadn’t taken the time to get her hair cut, so now the curls were just past her shoulders, riotous and messy. But oh, she loved his touch!
She told herself to move away from him. She ordered her brain to move her feet, to duck from his fingers. But she did none of that. Nor did she understand why she stood there, letting him touch her.
“I guess I could ask you the same question.” He chuckled. “What is a city girl like you doing way out here, in the middle of nowhere?”
“This isn’t nowhere,” she shot back.
“Close enough,” he countered with a one shouldered shrug.
“Please tell me that you’re not Kade Wilson,” she pleaded.
He chuckled again. Frankie couldn’t stop the shiver of awareness that bolted through her system. She remembered that laugh. Remembered how sexy it had sounded when she’d first heard it so many months ago. Different city. Different moment. Different circumstances. Same sensuous reaction!
“I’m afraid I am Kade Wilson, honey.”
Her mouth opened and closed, as if she wanted to argue his point but wasn’t sure how. “But…you live in Dallas!” She blurted. “I met you in Dallas!”
He nodded, the sunshine making his dark hair gleam. “Yeah, well…I was only there briefly.”
Wait a minute! Had he just hesitated? It had been slight, but Frankie had heard it! What was he hiding? Frankie’s spidey sense kicked in. As a child, she’d learned to sense hesitations and lies. Because of her childhood, she’d made a career out of discovering those secrets!
So, what was he hiding?
Whatever it was, hopefully, it wasn’t her problem. Besides, just like back in Dallas, she wouldn’t be around long enough to get to know him well enough to care about his secrets.
Besides, Frankie had a job to do! A very important job worth a great deal of money. Edward Meyers, her bastard of a client, had offered her a bonus if she could convince the third son, the last of the children that he’d ignored over the past thirty plus years, to come to Seattle. Ten thousand reasons why she needed to focus on business.
“I need your DNA,” she blurted out, then flinched, realizing how her request probably sounded. Crossing her arms over her stomach, she glared up at him. “Sorry,” she muttered through clenched teeth.
Kade Wilson. It was a very nice name. It wasn’t the name Edward Meyers, her client, had given her when he’d hired her for his third son, but that was not unexpected. Lots of people changed their names for all sorts of reasons.
She’d been hired to find this man and discover if he was one of Edward’s sons. If so, her client wanted her to somehow get this guy back to Seattle for a conversation. Only a conversation, Edward had assured her.
With that reminder firmly in mind, she pulled herself together and looked him right in the eye. “As you already know, I’m a private investigator, Mr. Wilson,” she started off, trying to be professional. “My client hired me to find his three sons. Your father is interested in talking with you.” If she hadn’t been watching him so closely, Frankie might have missed the way his eyes shuttered. A moment ago, those fascinating silver eyes had been glowing with curiosity and…dare she admit it? Desire. But at the mention of a father, those eyes had gone blank.
Interesting reaction, she thought. “My client would like to reunite with his children in the hopes of passing along a substantial amount of money.” She shifted on her feet. “I would need to confirm your DNA to ensure that you are my client’s son, which can be done easily and painlessly with a simple DNA test. A cheek swab that I’d send off to a private lab.”
There was a long silence. Flashes of their last moments together, that kiss, the heat that had swept through her…and all the nights since then, when she’d dreamed about him doing a whole lot more!
So, this silence felt…awkward. Painful, almost.
Finally, he shook his head. “No,” he crossed his arms over his impressively muscular chest.
Frankie blinked, surprised by his outright refusal. No questions or curiosity. He didn’t ask about the man who might be his father, nor about the amount of money involved. Just a simple, flat out rejection.
“No?” she repeated. “Just no? You don’t want to find out about your father?”
“My father died about six years ago,” he said flatly. His arms dropped and he moved closer. “Have dinner with me tonight.”
She blinked again, startled by abrupt subject change. She was still wondering why he wasn’t interested in meeting his father and…his father died? Dinner? Had he really just asked her out to dinner?
Wait. No, that wasn’t a question.
