The Heat Is On Read online

  Tyler had left, completely unnerved. Probably he wouldn’t be a returning customer, Bella thought with a sigh.

  “You okay?” Jacob asked.

  She’d had to ask herself that several times now, and she wasn’t used to not being sure. She was always okay, it was her M.O. And if she wasn’t, well, then, there was always someplace new. “Aren’t you getting tired of having to ask me that?”

  Silent, he stroked a big hand up and down her back.

  “For two people who aren’t involved,” she murmured, “we sure are seeing a lot of each other.”

  She felt him smile against her hair, and pulled back to look into his eyes. “I’ve always felt so safe here,” she said. “It’s why I stayed. I never thought of it before, but I like feeling safe. But now someone’s shooting at me. I know we joke about Siberia, but holy shit, am I really going to have to go?”

  “Would you?”

  When she thought about leaving, she felt a clutch in her gut. “No.”

  He nodded, clearly already guessing as much. “We’re going to figure it out.”

  “We? You mean, the police?”

  He made a vague response deep in his throat and pulled her out of the kitchen’s back door, carefully locking up.

  Then he led her upstairs toward her apartment.

  “I appreciate the sentiment,” she said to his broad back. “But fair warning, it’s going to take an act of Congress and possibly hypnosis to get me in the right frame of mind for sex.”

  He glanced back at her, his mouth slightly curved. “I’ll keep that in mind, but that’s not what we’re doing. I want you to pack an overnight bag.”

  “Excuse me?”

  His hand tightened on hers when she tried to pull free. “You’re not staying here tonight, Bella. Maybe not tomorrow night, either. Not until we know what the hell is going on and why you nearly took a hit today.”

  “Jacob—”

  “This is nonnegotiable, Bella. We have a man here but for tonight at least, you’re gone.”

  She looked into his eyes, fierce and protective and utterly stubborn.

  “I’m not saying you have to stay with me,” he said, bringing their joined hands to his mouth so that when he spoke, his lips brushed against her fingers. “I’m not trying to exert power or authority over you, just common sense. You can stay in a hotel, you can stay with a friend or you can stay with me. I don’t care, but you’re not staying here alone. Please,” he said very softly when she opened her mouth.

  She had a feeling he wasn’t a man to say please very often. Touched, she nodded her head, and turned to go into her place.

  He stopped her and moved inside first, once again thoroughly checking it out, giving her the go-ahead when he deemed it safe.

  Normally she liked watching him do his cop thing. It was macho and alpha and on any other day it would have made her knees weak and other parts quiver.

  But not now. Now she wanted the nightmare to go far, far away.

  He was helping with that just by being here for her instead of running off soon as he was done being questioned, like Tyler. Willow and Trevor had both left rather quickly, too, soon as they were able.

  Not Jacob.

  He wanted her safe. He was willing to do whatever it took to keep her that way.

  She racked her brain to try to remember the last time someone outside of her family had truly cared and worried about her, and she couldn’t come up with anything. This was easy enough to explain. Until recently, she hadn’t stuck around long enough for such ties.

  She would have to decide if she liked it.

  She filled a small backpack, and then realizing Jacob probably had his motorcycle, she slid on a pair of denim shorts beneath her halter sundress.

  They left her apartment, locked up, and in the lot, Jacob nodded to a guy walking the alley between the shop and the building next door.

  He nodded back.

  “My bodyguard?” she asked.

  Jacob actually smiled. “Tonight, I’m your bodyguard.” And he handed her a helmet.

  “What about Willow?”

  “Didn’t she tell you? She went to her mom’s.”

  No, she hadn’t mentioned that…

  “Where are we going?” she asked, getting on his bike behind him, hiking her dress up until it looked like a loose summer top over her shorts. She slipped her arms around him, her hands sliding across his washboard abs.

  “For food. You smell like sugar and vanilla and you’re making me hungry.”

  “I have—”

  “Your desserts are heaven, Bella, but I need real sustenance. And so do you. You’re pale.”

  And that was new, too. He was a guy who said what he meant, no sneaky charm to try to get her into bed, no pretty lies just to make her feel better. He told her what was on his mind and expected her to be mature enough to deal with it.

  Her first grown-up relationship, she realized, “casual” as it was—

  She broke off the thought with a startled squeak when he revved the bike and hit the throttle. The engine roared between her legs and suddenly, blessedly, just like that, her mind was off murder and bullets and she couldn’t decide which was better, hugging up to Jacob’s hard body, or the way he maneuvered them through the streets as if he were a part of the bike.

  She was still trying to decide when he pulled up to a small diner, where they were greeted by yet another smiley-faced waitress ready to serve his every need.

  After they’d ordered, Bella looked at him. “Must be tough, being so hated everywhere you go. Have you dated them all?” Slept with them all…?

  He looked at her for a long moment. “Who?”

  She rolled her eyes. “The women who fall all over themselves to make you smile.”

  “People in Santa Rey like cops.”

  And he was all cop. He was also all man.

  He pulled out a pad and pencil from his pocket and looked at her. “I want to hear about your eight dates,” he said, clearly done discussing women, his or otherwise.

  “Nice subject change.”

  He looked at her, torn between amusement and irritation. “Do you want to discuss the waitress—who, by the way, used to babysit me—or whoever’s screwing with your life?”

  Well, damn, when he put it that way… “I’ve already gone over all of this with Ethan. Twenty-five million times.”

  “So let’s do it twenty-five million and one. Maybe we’ve all missed something. Names and impressions.”

  “You think one of my dates is a crazy stalker.” She shivered at the thought. “Which doesn’t explain the second guy who got shot, the one across town.”

  “True, but there are a lot of possibilities here. Let’s work at narrowing them down.”

  He was all focused and fiercely intense, and when he was really concentrating—like now—he got that deep furrow in his brow.

  She wanted to forget the hell that was her current life and kiss that furrow away. What could she say. Yes, her sexual thoughts were inappropriate considering the moment, but it was a defense mechanism. And an easy one to cling to. For God’s sake, just look at him. Still watching him, she reached for her soda and sucked her straw.

  Immediately his eyes homed in on her mouth. Huh. Maybe she’d been wrong about needing an act of Congress to want sex. She smiled.

  And he raised a brow.

  She sucked some more soda down. “About that hypnosis I mentioned, to get in the right mind for sex…”

  His eyes dilated. “Distracting me isn’t going to end this conversation,” he said, voice husky. “You sure?”

  His gaze never left her mouth. “Positive. I can’t be distracted. It’s one of my gifts.”

  She was in a position to know that he had other gifts… Lightly, she ran her fingers down the straw, then sucked some more.

  Jacob let out a shaky breath. “Okay, new plan.”

  “Which is?”

  “You talk fast, and then we’re going back to my place.”