Harlequin Nocturne March 2016 Box Set Read online

  She nodded, hiding a smile. Stiffly, he backed away from her. She waited until he’d gone out the front door before she went after him to watch him cross the small piece of lawn between their bungalows. She could not figure him out. Not at all.

  CHAPTER 8

  The glass of red wine he’d downed had lit a fire in him that wasn’t going to go out. The whiskey wasn’t a good idea, not after last night and the wine and the conversation he’d had with Monica earlier, but then again, Jordan didn’t always make the best decisions. He downed one shot before getting in the shower, where his cock got hard as soon as he tried to soap up. He took another when he got out. His hair was still wet and he’d barely put on a fresh pair of jeans and a plain white T-shirt before she was knocking on his front door.

  “I brought dessert.” She held up one of the cook’s chocolate cakes. Jordan knew it by the scent of the icing. “I got it from the main house.”

  “Looks good. C’mon in.” He stepped aside to let her pass. He’d managed to tame his dick, but barely. When she brushed his belly with her arm, he felt it stirring again.

  They sat at his dining table. He’d put out a box of cheap chocolate doughnuts and made coffee, though the caffeine was going to do a number on him, as well. All of this was. Shit, he was going to need another run.

  She’d brought along her tablet to show him some of the things she’d been working on, and before he knew it, they were side by side on his couch while she ran through lists of what she was putting together. She smelled so good. It had been a mistake to invite her here, Jordan thought. He was too hungry.

  “But I don’t know.” Monica shook her head, then tucked a dark cherry curl behind her ear. She flicked her finger along a line of photos she’d pulled up. There was no denying the edge of excitement in her voice. “None of these things match the patterns. I’ve run through all the databases, and really, just...nothing.”

  “You love this, don’t you? The unknown.”

  She looked at him. “Love it? I’m not sure. I’ve always thought of love as something that makes you happy.”

  “Me, I’ve always thought it was something that made you miserable,” Jordan answered.

  Monica laughed. “How many times have you been in love, Jordan?”

  He didn’t have an answer. He’d been homeschooled since the age of fourteen, when his parents had yanked him out of public school at the first signs of what they both had prayed would never come true. He hadn’t gone to the prom, basketball games. Hadn’t played in the band. He’d gone to college too wary of other people to trust anyone enough to fall in love.

  “I thought so,” she said when he didn’t answer. “Sure, love can make you miserable. But it also makes you happy. So happy.”

  For a second, her gaze went faraway. Unexpectedly, Jordan envied the man who’d married her, the one who’d made her look that way. The one who’d died, he reminded himself.

  Monica shrugged off her expression. “Anyway. I have some calls and messages out to some of my colleagues, but at this point, I’m looking at something big. Something strong. Something that lives in the bayou.”

  “Anaconda? Python? Something like that?” He shook his head. “I know there’s a huge problem with that in Florida, but I told you, not so much here.”

  “Snakes don’t have claws.”

  “Gator?” He laughed at the idea, but Monica looked thoughtful.

  “Something like that,” she said. “You can laugh all you want, Jordan, but I’m good at what I do, and based on what I’ve seen and what you told me, I wouldn’t put something like a gator off the list.”

  “Gators can’t climb walls.”

  She smiled. “I said something like an alligator. But it’s definitely smart enough to figure out how to get through that wall and get what it wants.”

  He was silent for a moment, thinking. “You really believe all this stuff about things that go bump in the night.”

  “I believe in things that go bump in the sunlight, too.”

  He glanced at her to see if she was making a sexy innuendo, but all she gave him was that same blank, assessing look that was starting to make him crazy enough to want to do something to wipe it off her face. He frowned and scooped up another of the chocolate mini doughnuts from the box he’d put out. They were fat coated in fat with another layer of fat on them, but he needed the calories, or else he was definitely going to give Ms. Blackship a surprise she was not going to like.

  Her gaze followed the movement of his hand to the box, then to his mouth. Heat filtered through him at the way her eyes lit up, just the barest hint, and the way the tip of her tongue crept out to dimple her top lip.

  She caught him looking. “You don’t believe in any of this stuff. I know.”

  Jordan shook his head. “I work with real animals. Real things. You’re asking me to believe that some kind of monster is coming out of the bayou and slaughtering them? I’d be more likely to believe some kind of poachers—”

  “Except poachers would take the animals alive. If they were going to steal and resell the animals, they’d want them alive. Even if they only wanted the pelts,” she added, “they wouldn’t slaughter them on-site.”

  “No,” he admitted grudgingly. “I’ve been thinking about it, and you’re right.”

  She leaned forward a little. “DiNero believes it. That’s why he called the Crew.”

  “Then I guess that’s all it matters, huh?” He leaned back.

  Monica smiled a little. “Yeah. I guess it does.”

  They sat in silence for a minute or so that should’ve been awkward but was only quiet. It had been a long time since he’d sat with a woman this way, without idle chatter and inane small talk, stupid words to cover up the fact both of them were thinking only of how to get in each other’s pants with the least amount of effort. He couldn’t stop thinking about her flavor.

  “Look,” Monica said abruptly. “About last night.”

  “We don’t have to talk about it.”

  “No. We do. I don’t want you to think—”

  “I don’t think anything,” Jordan interrupted. “We’re both adults. It happened.”

  Monica shook her head. “But you didn’t like it.”

  “I didn’t—” Jordan cut himself off. “What the hell?”

  She laughed gently, tipping her face up. “I mean you didn’t like that it happened. Not that you didn’t like...it.”

  Jordan scowled. “It was unexpected. That’s all.”

  “It won’t happen again.”

  That did not actually make him feel any better. If anything, the thought that he would never again be inside her tightened a knot in his lower gut. He didn’t have words for her, though, just a low grunt.

  “I am sorry,” Monica said. “You were there, and I needed someone.”

  Jordan gave her a long, steady look. “Gee, way to make a fella feel special.”

  Monica ducked her head, looking embarrassed for a second, before popping up with the first genuine, full-fledged grin he’d seen on her. It lit her entire face. She was pretty, but that smile, that fucking smile... She was beautiful.

  He kissed her.

  He could have stopped himself. Years of therapy, of learning self-control, of discipline, of fighting the hunger—he could’ve done anything but kiss her. She was in his arms the second after that. She opened for him immediately. Her arms went around his neck, her fingers threading through his hair.

  He picked her up as easily as he would a bag of feathers. She moaned softly into his mouth. The hum of it sent an arc of electric desire straight to his already rock-hard cock. He settled her on the table and pushed himself between her legs. She moaned again when he pressed his erection against her. She wore a flowing pair of thin batik-printed pants that provided little barrier, but his denim