Oh, but she was sweet.

It wasn't sugar he thought of, or the kind of gooey candy that came wrapped in gold foil. It was honey, rich, thick, wild honey that you were compelled to lick off your finger. The kind that, even as a child, he'd never been able to resist.

When her lips opened for his, he dived in. Wanting more.

His hands weren't soft. That was the first wayward thought that stumbled into her brain. They were hard and strong and just a little rough. She could feel those fingers pressed against the back of her neck. The skin there seemed to be on fire.

He pulled her closer, so that their bodies made one long shadow on the littered gravel. As sensations swarmed through her system, she threw her arms around him and gave him back desire for desire.

It was different now. She thought she heard him curse before he changed the angle of the kiss, his teeth scraping over her lips and nearly making her cry out from the bolt of pleasure. Her heart was beating in her head, echoing in her ears like a train picking up speed in a tunnel.

It would break through any moment, break out of the dark and into the light, and then she would—

"Hey!"

The shout didn't even register. The movement of Sebastian's lips on hers did, a movement that was at first her name, and then another oath.

"Hey!"

Sebastian heard the shout, and the crunch of footsteps on gravel. He could cheerfully have committed murder. He kept one arm around Mel's waist and his hand firm on her neck as he turned his head and stared into a grizzled face under a Dodgers baseball cap.

"Go away." The order was close to a snarl. "Go very far away."

"Listen, bud, I just wanna know how come the bar's closed."

"They ran out of vodka." He could already feel Mel retreating from him, and would have sworn again if it would have done any good.

"Well, hell, all I want's a lousy beer." Having successfully destroyed the mood, the Dodgers fan clumped back to his pickup and drove off.

Mel had crossed her arms over her br**sts and was cupping her elbows as if she were warding off a brisk wind.

"Mary Ellen…" Sebastian began.

"Don't call me that." Staggered, she jerked back and came up hard against her car.

Her lips were vibrating. She wanted to press her hand against them to make it stop, but she didn't dare. Her pulse was beating in her throat in a quick, jumpy rhythm. She wanted that to stop, too, to slow and even out until it was normal and as it should be.

God. Good God. She'd been all over him, practically climbing on him. Letting him touch her.

He wasn't touching her now, but he looked like he might. Pride prevented her from shifting away, but she braced, ready to block another assault on her senses.

"Why did you do that?"

He resisted the urge to dip in and see what she was really feeling, to compare it to what was going on inside him. But he'd already taken unfair advantage. "I haven't the vaguest idea."

"Well, don't get any more ideas." She was surprised that his answer hurt. What had she expected? she asked herself. Did she think he might have said he'd been unable to resist her? That he'd been overwhelmed with passion? She lifted her chin.

"I can handle being pawed on the job, but not on my own time. Clear?"

His eyes flashed—once. Then, with more restraint than she could have imagined, he lifted his hands, palms out. "Clear," he repeated. "Hands off."

"All right, then." She wasn't going to make a big deal out of it, she decided as she dug in her bag for her keys. It was over. And it hadn't meant a thing to either of them. "I've got to get back, make some calls." When he took a step forward, her head snapped up, as if she were a deer scenting a wolf.

"I'm just opening your door," Sebastian said, though he discovered he wasn't the least bit displeased by her reaction.

"Thanks." She climbed in and slammed it herself. She had to clear her throat to be certain her voice would be careless. "Climb aboard, Donovan. I've got places to go."

"Question," he said after he slipped in beside her. "Do you eat?"

"Mostly when I'm hungry. Why?"

There was a wariness in her eyes that he was enjoying a great deal. "Seeing as all I've had since this morning was bar nuts, I was thinking late lunch, early dinner. Why don't you stop off somewhere? I'll buy you a burger."

She frowned over that for a moment, poking the suggestion for pitfalls. "I could use a burger," she decided. "But we'll go dutch."

He smiled and settled back his seat. "Whatever you say, Sutherland."

Chapter 4

Mel spent most of the morning doing door-to-doors in Rose's neighborhood with Sebastian's sketch in her hand. By that afternoon, the score was three positive IDs, four offers of coffee and one lewd proposition.

One of the positive IDs also corroborated Sebastian's description of the car, right down to the dented door. And that gave Mel a very uncomfortable feeling.

It didn't stop her from backtracking. There was a name on her list that continued to nag at her. Mel had a hunch Mrs. O'Dell in apartment 317 knew more than she was saying.

For the second time that day Mel knocked on the dull brown door, wiped her feet on the grass-green welcome mat with the white daisy in the corner. From inside she could hear the whining of children and the bright applause of a television game show.

As it had before, the door opened a few inches, and Mel looked down into the chocolate-smeared face of a young boy. "Hi. Is your mom home?"

"She don't let me say to strangers."

"Right. Maybe you could go get her."

Bumping a sneakered foot against the doorjamb, the boy seemed to consider. "If I had a gun, I could shoot you."

"Then it looks like this is my lucky day." She crouched down until they were eye-to-eye. "Chocolate pudding, right?" she said, studying the smears around his mouth. "Did you get that from licking the spoon after your mom made it?"

"Yeah." He shifted his feet and began to eye her with more interest. "How'd you know that?"

"Elementary, my dear puddingface. The smears are pretty fresh, and it's too close to lunch for your mom to let you have a whole bowl."

The boy tilted his head. "Maybe I snuck it."

"Maybe," Mel agreed. "But then you'd be pretty dumb not to wash off the evidence."