Tempted by Fate (20 page)

She scowled, entirely uncomfortable. “I wasn’t…”

He turned around and continued without waiting for her to finish. Eyes narrowed, she glared at him for a moment before following. He opened the door to a room and stepped inside. She waited in the doorway until he turned on the light.

The room was perfect. Masculine but relaxing and warm, just like the rest of the house. She looked at him and tried to compare the man she was coming to know with the no-nonsense cop she knew.

He opened a drawer and extracted a couple items, holding them out to her. “You can use these.”

She sauntered over to see what he offered. She took the bundle and held it up. “A sweatshirt and boxers.” She arched her brow at him. “Are you a leg man, Inspector?”

“I don’t have any pajama bottoms.”

“Really?” She tipped her head. “Are you blushing?”

A look of suspicion crossed his gorgeous face, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he grabbed a couple things and left the room, shutting the door behind him.

Willow walked around his bedroom slowly, noticing the absence of dust. There were several pictures of his grandmother over the years, but no pictures of other women or even parents and other siblings. She wondered what his story was. She should have asked his grandmother when she had the chance.

The bathroom was attached. It wasn’t lavish, but neither was it bare-bones like the one in the motel. The bath was a modern ceramic rendition of an old-fashioned claw-foot tub, and the shower was separate.

Impulse spurred Willow to plug the tub and run the water. She hadn’t indulged in a bath in longer than she remembered, and it seemed the perfect place to think. She found some bath salts under the sink and dumped a generous handful in. Sighing in relief as she slipped off her shoes, she stripped out of her clothes and eased into the tub.

A refreshing lemon scent teased her nostrils. His scent. She pictured him lying there, stretched out, naked,
head resting on the rim, right where hers was. Gloriously naked.

Her cell phone buzzed, skittering on the floor next to her meager pile of clothes. Dripping water, she leaned out of the tub and picked it up. Morgan, of course. She flipped it open.

Morgan was already talking before she had the chance to say hello. “—ere the hell are you? I lost connection to your system and haven’t been able to reach you. Did you think to call me to let me know what’s going on?
Noooo.
I’m just the grunt in the background. Who cares about me? I—”

Knowing Morgan could go on forever, Willow interrupted. “I was going to call you in the morning.”

“It
is
morning.”

“There have been developments.”

Pause. “Uh-oh. Whenever you say that, it always costs thousands of dollars to fix.”

Willow thought about all the equipment and clothing in her motel room. “That’s a fair assessment to make.”

“Jesus Christ. What happened?”

“I went to speak with the club owner, but he was dead—killed by a silver star.”

“Aw, crap.”

“I took the opportunity to go through his things, which is where Inspector Ramirez found me.”

“
Crap.
You aren’t in jail, are you? Wait, you answered your phone. Do they allow cell phones in jail?”

“I’m not in jail. I’m at Ramirez’s house.”

Silence stretched over the line. And then Morgan said, “Because hiding out in a cop’s house is smart, since that’s the last place he’d look for you?”

“No, since I asked the cop to help me find the Bad Man.”

“
What?
Are you smoking crack?”

“He has resources I no longer have. It’s to my benefit to have him help me.”

“You never work with anyone,” her partner pointed out. “
Ever.
It took me months to convince you to go into business with me.”

“Then this will be the first and last time.”

Morgan didn’t say anything for a long time, but Willow could feel her thinking. The manic tapping on the keyboard across the line was a dead giveaway. Morgan typed like crazy, but when she needed to think, she typed even faster.

Finally she said, “I’m arriving in San Francisco at two in the afternoon. I’ll find you.” She hung up.

Great. Willow closed the phone and tossed it onto the pile of clothes. She didn’t doubt that Morgan would find her, since the woman had mysterious ways Willow had never understood. Which made the Bad Man that much more clever for evading all the cybertraps her partner had set for him.

She wondered what Ramirez would make of Morgan. Men normally preferred her—Morgan was petite, bubbly, and smart. Not intimidating or cold, as some had called Willow. The only person who seemed not to notice Willow’s cold nature was Ramirez.

She frowned, brushing the surface of the water. Then again, he wasn’t beating down the door to the bathroom, trying to get with her, either. Why was that? A misplaced sense of chivalry? She remembered the way he’d tucked his coat around her and felt a queer flopping in her belly.

Disgusted with herself, she put her head on her drawn-up knees. She needed to pull herself together and make a plan. The Bad Man had left her a message, and she wasn’t going to let it go unanswered. She
couldn’t
let it go unanswered, not even for a righteous man who kissed divinely. She owed it to her mother. She needed it for herself.

R
amirez set the kettle on the stove top a little too hard, based on the sharp clang. He took down the tin of herbs his grandmother kept stocked in his kitchen. Lita said there was nothing tea didn’t cure. She said this particular blend encouraged relaxation, and that he needed to drink it morning, noon, and night.

If he ever needed help calming down, it was now.

He looked up at the ceiling. Overhead, Willow was taking a bath. He could hear the water running, and that was all he needed to get his imagination going. He could picture her slowly shimmying out of her clothes, letting them fall at her feet. Her bending over to unstrap the phone from her thigh. Her long legs folding into his tub, the water lapping her hardened nipples.

Shaking his head, he set a couple mugs on the counter. He needed to get his head back where it belonged, on his neck and not in his pants. He was sitting at the table, with a mug in his hands, wishing it was a tumbler of tequila
instead, when she walked into the kitchen. She had on the sweatshirt he’d given her, the boxer shorts missing.

She shrugged. “They kept sliding down.”

The sweatshirt covered just as much as her leather skirt had, but for some reason, it looked more enticing, almost illicit.

Any bit of calming effect the tea had on him faded in the presence of her bare tanned legs. Swallowing thickly, he gripped the mug so he wouldn’t be tempted to run his hands along them. It didn’t help knowing how soft her skin was.

She shifted her weight to one leg, cocking her hip. “I wouldn’t have figured you as the silk-boxer type.”

“I hate elastic.” Plus, silk was roomier, except for now. He felt like he was going to combust. He waved to the mug he’d set opposite him. “I made tea.”

“Hmm.” She strutted toward the table in that sensual way that muddled his thinking, picked up the mug, and breathed it in. “Your grandmother’s blend.”

He nodded, wondering what had gone on between the two women that day. Lita didn’t give her special tea to just anyone.

Willow took another deep inhale and then sank onto the chair that was next to him. “Your home is lovely.”

“Thank you.”

“It suits you.” She cradled the tea in her hands as she looked around the kitchen. “It must be nice having someplace this peaceful to come back to every night.”

If he didn’t know better, he would have thought that sounded wistful. “A condemned building isn’t peaceful?”

“Actually, it’s great. My neighbors are never home.” Her lips quirked as she raised the mug.

“You must have a place to go to at the end of the day.”

Humming noncommittally, she took another sip. When she set the cup down, she said, “Your grandmother thinks you need calming, too, huh?”

“Among other things. I’m surprised she didn’t give you the rundown.”

“Oh, she did. I kept expecting her to show me your resumé.” She chuckled, lifting her feet to prop them on one of the other chairs.

Was she trying to drive him insane? He tried not to stare at the long length of skin, but it was impossible. He was having a hard time not placing them in his lap and massaging them.

He wanted to hear her purr.

Yet, he still couldn’t understand, why her? Why
this
woman?

He stared at her, trying to figure it out. Of course he was a guy, and a stunning woman would attract his attention, but he’d known stunning women before, ones who weren’t implicated in several murders. Why was it he wanted to kiss the insolent smile off her face and strip her bare, body and soul, for his eyes only?

So much for staying professional. He watched her lick a stray drop from the lip of her cup, and he knew it was a lost cause. He’d been moving to this point from the moment he saw her walking away from his crime scene, her hair gleaming in the moonlight. Lita would reiterate that Willow was his fate; it was futile to struggle against it. In other words, he was doomed.

If he was going to do this, it’d be on his terms. He’d make sure to mitigate any potential damage up front. “We need to establish the ground rules.”

Her eyes went flat, all the ease dissipating in a blink. “The only ground rule that needs to be established is that I’m going to hunt down the Bad Man and deliver him to you.”

“No.”

She put her mug down so hard it made a sharp
clack.
“That’s the deal.”

His temper rose in his throat, and he had to suppress it. He hadn’t had so much trouble controlling it since he was a teenager. “As I see it, you don’t have any bargaining power here. You’re only here by my good graces.”

“I’m here because you need me to catch the bastard who’s killing people on your turf.” She stood up, hands on her hips. “You’ll only get in the way, with all your rules and laws.”

He stood and faced her. “Rules and laws are what keep people in order.”

“Yeah, rules have worked
really
well with the Bad Man thus far.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm.

He ignored it, focusing on the issue. “Why do you call him
the Bad Man
?”

She blinked. “That’s what he is, isn’t he?”

He sensed her discomfort. “That’s all you’ve called him. Doesn’t he have a name?”

Glaring at him, she picked up her mug and dumped it in the sink.

“You don’t know his name,” he said with sudden clarity. He walked to her and turned her around. “You don’t know who he is.”

“I know who he is.” Her eyes shot daggers at him. “Not knowing his name is a mere formality.”

“A mere formality?” He barked a disbelieving laugh. “I’d like to see what you call a complete unknown.”

Willow poked him in the chest. “I told you I’d deliver him. That’s all you need to know.”

“I need to know a whole lot more than that.” He crowded her until her back pressed against the edge of the sink and his body was crushed against hers. He gripped the counter around her and leaned in. “I don’t think you understand the situation here. I’ve put my career on the line for you.”

“You’ve put your career on the line to bring your perp to justice.” She lifted her chin, avoiding his eyes. “I’m only the means, so don’t go romanticizing what’s going on here.”

“What is going on here?” he asked through gritted teeth, because he sure as hell didn’t know. One minute she flirted with him, like she wanted to eat him whole, and the next she was all business.

“We’re using each other to catch the man we both want.”

She said it so matter-of-factly that he saw red. He wasn’t an idiot. He’d known all along she was using him. He just wanted it to be for more than catching her mother’s killer. “So that’s it? That’s all you want from me?”

“That’s all either of us could want,” she said coolly.

He almost believed she meant it. She delivered it so convincingly, without the tiniest bit of feeling.