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The Devil You Know
Laurie Paige


JUST MARRIED!VERONICA DALTON AND ADAM SMITH, AFTER A SHORT ENGAGEMENT…Sparks sizzled from the moment beautiful computer whiz Roni Dalton laid eyes on Adam Smith. But a year after their initial meeting, one torrid night of passion together left them with more than they bargained for: a marriage license!DID THE DEVIL MAKE HIM DO IT?Feeling honor-bound to his new bride, the FBI agent agreed to commit himself to his wife, at least temporarily. But Roni couldn't just settle for the marriage of convenience her husband demanded. She had to convince Adam that her love was worth the ultimate gift–his heart.









“Remember our agreement,” Adam said. “We want a clean break when the time comes.”


“That’s what you want,” Roni said.

Now he frowned openly. Leaning close, he asked, “So what do you want?”

“We made vows, Adam. For better, for worse, through sickness and health. We promised to love, honor and cherish. Then we sealed those vows with a kiss. Did you have your fingers crossed all that time?”

Again she had that odd rush of tears. Again she forced it at bay. Adam would hate it if she showed pity for him.

She dropped her hands to her lap. “Sometimes, life won’t let you take a ‘time-out’ from living,” she told him very gently. “We are truly married, whether you want to be or not.”


Dear Reader,

It’s October, the time of year when crisper temperatures and waning daylight turns our attention to more indoor pursuits—such as reading! And we at Silhouette Special Edition are happy to supply you with the material. We begin with Marrying Molly, the next in bestselling author Christine Rimmer’s BRAVO FAMILY TIES series. A small-town mayor who swore she’d break the family tradition of becoming a mother before she becomes a wife finds herself nonetheless in the very same predicament. And the father-to-be? The very man who’s out to get her job….

THE PARKS EMPIRE series continues with Lois Faye Dyer’s The Prince’s Bride, in which a wedding planner called on to plan the wedding of an exotic prince learns that she’s the bride-to-be! Next, in The Devil You Know, Laurie Paige continues her popular SEVEN DEVILS miniseries with the story of a woman determined to turn her marriage of convenience into the real thing. Patricia Kay begins her miniseries THE HATHAWAYS OF MORGAN CREEK, the story of a Texas baking dynasty (that’s right, baking!), with Nanny in Hiding, in which a young mother on the run from her abusive ex seeks shelter in the home of Bryce Hathaway—and finds so much more. In Wrong Twin, Right Man by Laurie Campbell, a man who feels he failed his late wife terribly gets another chance to make it up—to her twin sister. At least he thinks she’s her twin…. And in Wendy Warren’s Making Babies, a newly divorced woman whose ex-husband denied her the baby she always wanted, finds a willing candidate—in the guilt-ridden lawyer who represented the creep in his divorce!

Enjoy all six of these reads, and come back again next month to see what’s up in Silhouette Special Edition.

Take care,

Gail Chasan

Senior Editor




The Devil You Know

Laurie Paige





www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


To T., who is serving her country.

Thanks for writing, Laurie.




LAURIE PAIGE


Laurie has been a NASA engineer, a past president of the Romance Writers of America, a mother and a grandmother. She was twice a Romance Writers of America RITA


Award finalist for Best Traditional Romance and has won awards from Romantic Times for Best Silhouette Special Edition and Best Silhouette in addition to appearing on the USA TODAY bestseller list. Recently resettled in Northern California, Laurie is looking forward to whatever experiences her next novel will send her on.










Contents


Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen




Chapter One


V eronica Dalton glanced at her watch and wrinkled her nose in mock despair. “Gotta punch the time clock,” she declared. She counted out enough money to cover her part of the check and tip.

Her best friend, Patricia Upjohn, rolled her eyes at the totally false statement. “Roni, Roni,” she scolded. “Count your blessings. Others should be so lucky as to have your hours. And your boss.”

With a degree in computer science, Roni worked at home, writing computer learning games for children. Her actual working hours were up to her.

And Patricia was right about the boss. Besides being nice, a great guy and all that, he was a hunk. A woman with any sense would go for him in a heartbeat.

Roni tried to look contrite. “I agree. You bankers pay the price for serving humanity.”

“We do our best,” Patricia said humbly.

This time it was Roni who rolled her eyes. “Same time next week?” she asked, standing.

“Right.”

She bid her friend goodbye and threaded her way through the luncheon crowd. The Friday crunch was getting worse, it seemed to her. They might have to select another day for their weekly lunch. Maybe she could talk her boss into changing their Friday morning meetings to Monday.

No, bad idea. People tended to be grouchy first thing on Mondays. Tuesdays would work, though. Or Wednesdays.

Contemplating what other day of the week would be better for Patricia, she detoured past a group who were still saying their farewells and blocking the narrow space around their table. At that moment, one of the departing men stepped backward without looking. He crashed into Roni, sending her careening to the right…and facedown onto the next table.

At nose level—she wasn’t quite lying prone on the white cloth—she observed as water glasses and coffee cups jostled wildly while dinner plates skidded dangerously near the edge. She had a split second to be grateful the plates were mostly empty and that she hadn’t landed on one.

The larger and older of the two men took the brunt of the accident as hot and cold liquids sloshed onto his lap.

“I’m so sorry,” she managed to say as the man leaped from his chair and gave her an indignant glare as he brushed droplets from his clothing. Luckily his napkin had absorbed most of the damage.

“Oh, sorry,” muttered the coward who’d bumped her. He hurried away, leaving her to face the wrath of the drenched diner alone.

“Use this,” a masculine baritone advised.

A clean napkin was thrust into her hand. She carefully blotted drops off the other man’s tie. “Blot, don’t swipe,” she told the furious diner. “That way, you won’t push the stain into the material.”

Having grown up in an all male household—two older brothers, three older cousins, plus Uncle Nick, who’d raised all six orphans—she’d learned early how to manage most household tasks. Finished, she surveyed the man. “There, not a stain in sight,” she said in relief.

“A good thing for you,” the man snarled.

“It wasn’t her fault,” his companion said. “The other man knocked her off her feet. Are you okay?” he asked her.

Roni swung her head around in shock as recognition flashed through her. A jolt went all the way to her toes as she met the cool gray gaze of the man who’d handed her the napkin. “Adam!” she said, then couldn’t think of another word, she was that surprised to see him.

Adam Smith was the very attractive but aloof brother of Honey Smith Dalton, who was married to Roni’s cousin Zack. Neither had mentioned that Adam was expected in the area. Why was he in the city rather than at the ranch? And why was he dressed in a business suit? Was he working?

Along with the questions came the intense excitement and pure joy of seeing him, all mixed up with a welter of other emotions too confusing to be defined. So she stood there smiling at him, speechless but smiling radiantly in happy surprise.

“Hello, Little Bits,” he said with casual amusement.

Before she could question him about his presence in Boise, Idaho, when she knew he worked in the southern California office of the FBI, he stood, gathered her close and kissed the startled “Oh!” off her mouth.

In this swirl of confusion, she felt herself being lifted off her feet and turned so that Adam’s back was to his companion. He released her mouth and nibbled at her ear. “I’ll explain later,” he murmured for her hearing only.

She blinked, forced herself to breathe, then nodded as if she knew what he was talking about.

“Roni, this is Greg Williams,” Adam continued, turning them to the other man. “Greg, Veronica Dalton. Call her Roni if you value your life.”

Greg was poster handsome, but beginning to run to fat. Too many three-martini lunches, she surmised. He wasn’t as old as she’d first thought, but was around the same age as Adam, who was thirty-six, ten years older than her own twenty-six years. Whenever they happened to be at the same place at the same time, he treated her as if she were a precocious six-year-old. Hence her shock at the kiss.

“I didn’t realize you had friends here,” Greg said to Adam, eyeing them both suspiciously.

“I’ve worked with her cousin on a couple of things,” Adam replied with that same casual amusement. “We met at his wedding. Naturally I looked her up when I came to town.”

Liar.

The word leaped to Roni’s lips, but she didn’t say it. Instead she smiled demurely and tried not to appear confused as the falsehoods fell from his lips as easily as rain from a stormy sky.

His hand rested on the small of her back—a warm, beguiling touch that made her want to lean into him. Since it was totally at odds with the manner in which they’d parted two months ago at her uncle’s ranch—he’d made it clear there was nothing between them and there would never be—she resisted the urge.

The only explanation for his sexy, shocking and out-of-character greeting, and his presence here rather than a thousand miles away, was that he must be on a case. Therefore, she would keep her mouth shut and her questions to herself. For the present.

Speculation now leaped into the other man’s eyes while he sized her up. He gave a half shrug as if deciding she wasn’t his type, then moved aside as the waiter finally came forward and deftly began removing the wet tablecloth.

“See you later,” Adam said, his tone affectionate, but the jab in the small of her back told her to leave. Pronto!

She did.

Adam smiled at the friendly squeak of the wooden plank as he crossed the front porch and rang the doorbell of the tiny house located in a block of similar cottage-style homes. The address had surprised him. He’d expected Roni Dalton to live in one of the new, ultra-smart condos being built in prime areas around the city. This neighborhood was definitely blue-collar.

The Saturday morning activities were what he would expect in such a place. It was the third of May, a sunny, pleasant day to be outside. Two doors down, a teenager was polishing an older model car to a high gloss. It was probably his first vehicle. The family compact station wagon was parked on the street.

Next door, an elderly black couple worked in the yard, weeding around hundreds of spring bulbs that were in bloom in raised flower beds. Roni’s yard was similar, a springtime riot of flowering quince, forsythia, tulips and daffodils.

For a moment, he recalled that daffodils had been his mother’s favorite flower. “Daffy-down-dillies,” she’d called them, bringing an armful into the kitchen and arranging them in empty mayonnaise jars so that they’d looked like splashes of sunshine in the house.

An unexpected pang accompanied the nearly forgotten memory, reminding him that once he’d thought life was perfect. Mom and dad, a new baby sister, a house in a quiet neighborhood, flowers and friends and cook-outs in the backyard. A ten-year-old’s world was small.

The door opened, bringing his thoughts back to the present. Roni gave him an unwelcome glare. “I expected you yesterday,” she stated.

She didn’t step back and open the door so he could enter. He wasn’t inclined to discuss his business on the squeaky wooden porch that ran across the front of the house.

“May I come in?” he asked, keeping his tone neutral and carefully polite. In contrast, his heart was suddenly pumping like an athlete’s in the final phase of a triathlon.

She wore a sort of sweat outfit, only it was made of a fleecy material like a baby blanket. Its deep royal blue matched that of her eyes. Dalton eyes. The whole tight-knit clan had those same startling blue eyes, as blue as an afternoon sky on a summer day in the mountains.

Unlike the tall, rangy males in her family, she was petite, maybe five-three, with tiny bones and slender curves. Nearly black hair lay in thick, shining waves to the middle of her back. Black eyebrows and eyelashes accented the color of her eyes and her fair skin. The pink in her cheeks was natural.

A tiny Venus. A tomboy. A computer whiz. He’d met her nearly a year ago and she still intrigued him.

Don’t get carried away, he warned, taking an amused attitude at the heart-pounding, blood-warming sight before him. He’d dealt with women more beautiful, more sophisticated and certainly more agreeable than this one in both his professional and his private life.

However, she could qualify for the most obstinate female he’d ever run across, he decided while he waited for her to make up her mind.

After mulling his request over for a full thirty seconds, she finally moved aside enough so that he could get in the door. Only a tiny part of his mind registered the closing of the door behind them as he surveyed the room.

The place was awash with color, pink and green being predominant. The kitchen and living room had been remodeled into one large, open space with an island separating them. A sink was handily located in the island, and two tall stools on the near side provided a place for casual dining.

On the back wall, an old-fashioned stove, enameled in green, held a simmering pot of soup or stew or something that smelled delicious.

The area rug was green with roses woven into it in multiple hues of pink. A green, white and black border highlighted the center floral part. White beadboard lined the bottom three feet of the wall, matching the cabinets in the kitchen. Pink-striped wallpaper covered the walls of the living room while green and white tiles formed the counter and the backsplash.

An oak armoire was open and revealed a television in its upper section. A sofa in tan and green chenille, an easy chair in tan leather and an oak rocker with pink and green plaid cushions completed a cozy grouping. End tables and a sturdy coffee table were laden with potted plants and magazines about computers and gardening.

The coffee table was painted white, but the green paint from a former life was visible along the edges and legs, and before that, it might have been black. On the walls, family photographs were mixed in casual groupings with gilt-framed mirrors and dark wooden frames of still life paintings that could have come from an ancient attic. Off to one side—where a dining table should have been, he surmised—a quilt was rolled on a quilting frame, a needle with gold thread stuck in one of the squares of material as if the seamstress would be gone only a moment.

The effect of the furnishings was one of odds and ends put together in a charming fashion. For some reason, the place made him feel uneasy, as if he were an unwelcome intruder into her personal space.

“The bathroom is through there,” she said, gesturing toward a door.

Adam realized he’d been silent and staring for much longer than polite interest allowed. “What are the other doors?” he asked, indicating the rectangular hallway to the left of the living room. Three doors opened off it, the middle one being the bathroom she’d pointed to.

“Two bedrooms. I use one for an office.” She went into the kitchen and held up a coffeepot, giving him a questioning glance.

He nodded, and she poured them each a cup of coffee. She pushed one across the surface of the island in his direction. He stepped closer and leaned an elbow on the green and white tiles while he took a sip of the brew.

“This is good,” he said. “Strong and hot, just the way I like it.”

“I remember,” she said. “From the wedding.”

The Dalton family had come to LA so he could participate in his sister’s wedding. He’d walked Honey down the aisle and given her into Zack Dalton’s loving arms.

The emotion of the moment had surprised him. But then, his little sis was about the only thing in the world that he loved unconditionally and without reserve.

When Honey had been a baby, their father had been killed in a bar shoot-out. The quiet, gentle man hadn’t been involved but was just in the wrong place at the wrong moment when a couple of punks had run into each other and pulled their pieces, killing three bystanders. Then their mom had died when Honey was three and he was thirteen. They had gone to live with an aunt who hadn’t wanted them.

So much for his family ties.

Roni’s life hadn’t been all that easy, he admitted to himself, pulling out a stool and straddling it. She, too, had been orphaned when a freak avalanche had wiped out her family.

Luckily, her uncle, Nicholas Dalton of Seven Devils Ranch, located near a small town about an hour’s drive north of the city, had taken the kids in and given them a good home. A loving home. Yeah, she’d been lucky.

“So what are you doing in town?” she asked, direct and to the point, as usual.

He’d already considered and discarded several answers to this question. He’d decided on the truth. With her, it was the only way. “Working.”

“In Boise? Since when?”

Adam smiled in resignation. In a city of barely 200,000 population, he hadn’t really thought he could avoid her forever, especially since his sister was married to her cousin. But he’d hoped.

“Since last month. I’ve been in town two weeks. I’m on new assignment. Bank fraud division.”

“Bank fraud,” she repeated blankly.

He didn’t blame her for the incomprehension. He’d been undercover on a police corruption case when they’d met. The white-collar world of offshore corporations, wired money transfers and fake companies was far from rogue cops, drug-trafficking and extortion.

“I recently finished the course work for a degree in business,” he added as if this explained everything.

In a way it did. International crime being what it was, agents proficient in accounting and computer science were more valuable to the bureau on a day-to-day basis than sharpshooters and such.

“And?”

He shrugged. “And I’ve been assigned to this district to investigate corporate fraud.”

“Like, you hack into their computer systems and read their e-mails and see what the executive officers are up to?”

“Hardly,” he replied. “Banks are required by law to report movements of large sums of money under certain conditions—”

“Money laundering,” she interrupted.

“That might figure into it,” he admitted.

“Offshore corporations to hide debt,” she continued.

Her beautiful eyes gleamed with interest now. He suppressed a groan. He didn’t need her meddling any more than he needed the insistent hunger she induced in him. It echoed through him now, a primal drive that couldn’t be denied, although he tried to ignore it.

That kiss in March, when they’d both visited their mutual relatives, had been a mistake, a madness that had buzzed through him and shredded his good intentions, which were to avoid her as much as possible and never, ever so much as touch her hand. So here he was, in her charming home, yesterday’s kiss fresh in his mind.

What was that saying? Out of the frying pan and into the fire? Yeah, that was it.

“I can help,” she told him. “I’m really good with a computer. We could put a worm in their program—”

“I have plenty of expertise within the department to call on,” he informed her coolly. “If I need it.”

“Yes, I suppose you do,” she said, in as cool a tone as he’d used. She glanced at the wall clock. “It’s time for lunch. Do you want to join me? There’s plenty.”

He knew he shouldn’t. Common sense told him to leave and not look back. He should make it clear he wanted her to stay out of his life and his cases. Instead, he nodded.

“That smells incredibly good,” he said when she set a brimming bowl in front of him.

“Uncle Nick’s specialty.” Her smile was warm. “On Saturday, he’d throw all the leftovers in a pot and make ‘poor-man’s stew.’ With fresh bread, that was our dinner.”

She removed a big skillet of corn bread from the oven, flipped it over on a platter, cut it into wedges, then put it and the butter on the island. She joined him on the matching stool. “Here’s to your health,” she said, picking up her spoon.

He ate three pieces of corn bread and two bowls of stew. “That was the best meal I’ve had since…since I last visited your uncle’s ranch.”

Instead of looking pleased at the compliment to her relative, her mood became pensive.

“What?” he asked, his voice dropping a register and sounding way too intimate in the silent cottage. He cleared his throat.

“Uncle Nick,” she murmured. “Beau says he’s doing fine, but I worry about him. He’s had a couple of spells with his heart this winter. I wish…”

“You wish?” he finally prompted when she was silent for a long minute.

“I wish we could find Tink for him.”

Adam knew that Theresa, or Tink, as she was called, was Nick’s only child and had disappeared at the scene of a car wreck that had killed her mother when the girl was only three and a half. The Dalton patriarch was in his seventies and had always longed to find his missing daughter. Beset with heart problems, his time could be running out.

For a few seconds, he contemplated the older man’s pain at losing his wife and child in that manner, then he shook his head. That was one reason he’d never let himself get too deeply involved with a woman. Emotion was too costly.

“What?” he asked, noting Roni’s sharp stare.

“Maybe you could help. I know, you can help me find Tink, and I’ll help you with your case.” She smiled brightly as if this solved some grand problem in the universe.

“Huh,” he said, putting a damper on that idea.

She gave him a grimace, then her impish grin returned. “You’ll be sorry you turned down such a good offer. I make a hundred dollars an hour as a consultant in my spare time.”

“Bully for you,” he muttered.

She laughed, then refilled his coffee cup. “Let’s go over here where it’s more comfortable.”

He took the leather easy chair while she snuggled into a corner of the sofa, kicked off her loafers and tucked her feet under her. Heat stirred through him. It settled in the lower part of his body, making him hot and wary of lingering in her house.

His usual reaction to her, he admitted. Lust and caution. How was that for a mixed combination?

“When did you get this place?” he asked as the silence became heavy with tension. Or maybe it was just him.

She seemed perfectly at ease as she blew gently over the surface of the hot coffee. “A month ago. I often jogged through this neighborhood and saw it as soon as it came on the market. I decided I’d rather have a house of my own, so I sold the condo and bought this.”

“With the increase in home prices, that was probably a wise move.”

“Will you be looking for a place to buy?”

“No.”

“You needn’t look as if a home is a ball and chain. It could be a good investment, even for someone who moves around fairly often. And you get tax breaks. My brother has preached home ownership as long as I can remember.”

Adam assumed she referred to Seth, who was an attorney and the oldest of her siblings. Her other brother was a doctor. One of her cousins was a deputy sheriff—he’d told Greg the truth when he’d said he’d worked with Roni’s cousin—while two others were ranchers. The five Dalton males and Roni, the lone female of the six orphans taken in by their uncle, had pitched in to build a resort in the mountains beside a small lake. If all went well, it was supposed to open this summer.

He realized that, with his sister married to the deputy, he knew a lot about the Dalton family. Their ancestors had been on the ranch for well over a hundred years. First Family of Idaho and all that. One cousin was married to a senator’s daughter. The senator was running for governor and would likely be elected in November.

For himself, he knew his family history only to his parents. All the grandparents had died before or shortly after his birth. Where their people had come from, he hadn’t a clue, except they were European for the most part with a little Hispanic and possibly Native American brought in from his mother’s grandmother.

Giving himself a mental shake, he wondered what the heck was wrong with him today. A glance at Roni gave him a hint. Each time he came into contact with her he ended up frustrated and angry.

Because he wanted her.

“What is it?” she suddenly asked.

“What is what?” he countered.

“Heavy sigh. Grim face. I know you aren’t involved with a woman. So, did someone just shoot your dog?”

“How do you know I’m not involved with a woman?” he demanded, irked at her certainty.

“Honey said you didn’t allow anyone to get too close. Your sister worries about your being all alone in the cold, cruel world.”

“My sister should take care of herself and not worry about me,” he muttered.

Roni smiled. “Then you know she’s expecting.”

The news stunned him.

She studied him. “You didn’t know. Well, no one told me it was a secret. She announced it last Sunday when we had dinner at the ranch. If you visited more often, then you would catch up on the news.”

A baby. His little sister. He’d looked after her since she was three years old. It felt odd that she was now involved in a major life change with no input from him.

Roni continued, her eyes dreamy the way women’s went when talking about babies and all that. “With Beau having a son, then Travis and Alison having their baby in March and now Zack and Honey expecting, Uncle Nick is in heaven. He’s hot after the rest of us to settle down and start families.”

Other than his sister’s nuptials, Adam had avoided the rash of Dalton marriages the past year by dint of his work. Roni’s two brothers had married only a few months ago.

“Must be something in the water,” he said, irritated by this whole conversation.

The youngest Dalton orphan laughed in delight. “That’s what I told Uncle Nick. I said I was bringing my own bottled water with me to the ranch in the future.”

“Good thinking,” Adam told her sardonically.

She gave him a shrewd glance. “Uncle Nick said if I got pregnant without being married the man would answer to him.”

“And to your brothers and cousins.”

“Yes. They all agreed they would straighten things out for me.”

Her laughter became a sigh as she lapsed into introspection. Women made him nervous when they talked of babies and marriage. He had no time for it, and he always made that clear at the beginning of a relationship.

Relationship? Other than one six-month, on-again, off-again entanglement, at the end of which he’d been accused of indifference, he hadn’t seen a woman socially for…mmm, two years?

Yep, it had been at least that long. Once he’d started working on the police corruption case in LA, he’d been in deep cover. He hadn’t even communicated with his sister except under the most secret of coded messages.

Even that precaution had failed.

The thugs had sent hit men looking for her in order to flush him out. She could have been killed—

He put a halt to his morbid thoughts. All had ended well with the case wrapped up, the hit men and the bad cops behind bars and his life in the open again. Investigating corporate crime was mostly an office job, nine to five and weekends free.

Free.

That suited him just fine and that was the way he intended to stay. Women always wanted more—more time, more commitment, more of everything. He’d learned to keep things on a light note.

“Anyway,” he said, eager to finish the conversation and get out of the cozy bungalow, “I just wanted to let you know I’m too busy to be involved with you in any capacity.”

There, that should make things clear to her.

Her dark, delicately arched eyebrows rose as she gave him a lofty perusal.

“Get over yourself,” she advised.




Chapter Two


T he following Friday Roni surveyed the outfits she’d selected, decided they would have to do, and closed her suitcase. If she hadn’t accepted Scott’s invitation a month ago to spend a leisurely weekend at the Masterson family estate, she would have preferred to stay home.

Ah well, it might do her good to get out of the house and away from the city for the weekend. After months of near total absorption, she’d finished her part of the current project and turned over the files to her boss that morning.

Reaching a goal usually gave her a lift, but not this time. She was drained mentally and physically, having driven herself to exhaustion the past week to bring the software learning program in on time.

Hearing the doorbell, she quickly slipped into a denim jacket, glanced around to make sure she wasn’t forgetting anything, then grabbed her suitcase and headed for the door.

“Hello. I hope we’re ahead of the traffic,” she said to the handsome young scion of one of the richest families in the area.

“I’m afraid not. It’s already backed up on the freeway. I drove the back streets to get here. It was faster.” Scott Masterson smiled, took the luggage and held the screen door while she secured the dead bolt. “Ready?” he said when she turned to him.

“Ready.”

His car was a top-of-the-line model. Leather seats. Heated, of course. If she could figure out the buttons on the side of the seat, she thought she could probably get a massage, too. Scott caught her amused smile and smiled back.

He was the country club-tennis set type, with dark hair and eyes, a lean profile, great teeth and smile, charming and polite…everything a maiden’s heart could wish for.

Another image came to mind—a stern, forbidding face that somehow had the ability to rock her heart. Adam had appealed to her from the first moment they’d met nearly a year ago. Her cousin Zack had been shot while working on a case with the elusive FBI agent.

She’d also known from the first that Adam was bad news as far as she was concerned. The sparks had been there between them, but he’d stayed aloof. And, as his sister had once said, Adam was like a will-o’-the-wisp, a here today, gone tomorrow type of guy.

The type to break a girl’s heart into pieces.

One couldn’t say he didn’t play fair. He’d warned her there would be no involvement of any kind. He was dedicated to his job. Because of its inherent danger, Adam hadn’t allowed close relationships. But that was then, and this was now. Now, he worked in the fraud division, and he’d moved to her territory. Not that this necessarily meant anything, but it was something to think about.

Her attitude lightened as the miles peeled away beneath the tires. The country road ran alongside the Boise River, first on one bank, then across a bridge and on the other side for a while, leisurely tracing the meander of the rushing water farther into the country.

Shortly before five o’clock, Scott turned onto a gravel driveway. The roadside was lush with native trees and flowering shrubs that opened suddenly to allow a view of rolling meadows dotted with cattle, then a lawn and a neotraditional-style house—white, two stories, balcony over a broad, welcoming front porch—nestled into a gentle hill.

“Lovely,” she said.

“It’s home,” he said modestly.

She noted the affection in his tone. He’d grown up here and it obviously meant as much to him as the ranch did to her. Her eyes went misty, surprising her. She wasn’t the sentimental sort.

Growing up with five boisterous boys hadn’t left much time for sentiment, she mused wryly as Scott hit a button, waited for the garage door to open, then pulled into the space. She’d learned early in life not to cry. Tears were wasted on men.

Blinking the odd moment of emotion away, she saw that the Masterson garage was neater than her house. In fact, there was nothing but cars in it. No lawn equipment or trash barrels or half-used paint cans.

Yeah, but they have servants, she concluded, excusing her penchant for clutter and familiar things around her.

“This way,” Scott said, carrying his weekend case and her larger piece of luggage. He probably had a closet full of clothes here as well as in his condo in town.

They went into a family room or den, then up a flight of steps. His room was next to hers, he told her, indicating a door as he set his case down in front of it. He led the way into the next bedroom. She glanced around while he placed her case on a rack in the spacious closet.

“This is truly lovely,” she said.

The room was très chic, done in shades of beige and gold. From the off-white, cream and beige tumbled marble tiles in the bathroom to the solid marble panels surrounding the fireplace, from the light beige carpet to the deeper toned satin comforter shot with gold that covered the bed, it was a study in peaceful luxury.

Pillows were heaped on the bed, the smallest covered in gold satin with velvet ribbons, the middle ones in tan, beige and gold stripes and the largest ones covered in pillow shams of golden-brown suede cloth.

Two padded chairs formed an intimate grouping before the fireplace, which was filled with greenery and pinecones and had a many-branched candelabra on the hearth.

A writing table and chair were placed before two tall windows. From the vantage point of the second floor, she could see the tennis courts where a man and woman played against each other with zealous intent to win.

She noted the man had brown hair with golden streaks. The woman was all blond, but Roni thought that was with the help of a good hair stylist. Judging from the similarity in facial features, the woman was Scott’s sister. The man’s back was to her, so she couldn’t identify him. She turned to her host.

“I feel as if I’m in a very exclusive spa,” she told Scott after he made sure she had everything she needed.

He grimaced. “My stepmother had all the rooms updated a couple of years ago. It was too Victorian, she said.”

His mother had died of breast cancer a few years ago. His father had remarried eight months later. A rush of sympathy made her smile perhaps too warmly. Before she realized what was happening, he’d bent close and kissed her.

“Cocktails at six in the library,” he murmured in a definitely husky voice.

After he left, she ran her fingers over her mouth as if wiping the kiss away. She and Scott had hit it off right away when she did some consulting work for CTC-Cascade TelCom, a telecommunications company his grandfather had started—but she wasn’t ready for serious involvement.

And his gaze had been very serious.

That worried her. Uncle Nick had lectured them about hurting other people’s feelings or letting things go too far when friendship was all you had in mind. He was big on honesty and all that.

Drifting to the double set of windows, she gazed out at the idyllic scene. The sun was going down and the house shaded the two tennis courts. The man served a high-speed ace, which the woman wasn’t able to return. She shook her racket at him.

Although she couldn’t hear it, Roni could tell the man was laughing. Then the woman was, too. They walked off the court and, chatting animatedly, came toward the house.

Roni’s heart gave a lurch she felt throughout her body. It couldn’t be! It just couldn’t be!

When he looked up as the couple climbed the steps onto the patio, she quickly stepped back from the window.

You can run, but you can’t hide.

Her uncle’s cautionary advice rang through her head as she glanced around the room as if looking for a bolt-hole to crawl into. While Uncle Nick meant a person couldn’t hide from his or her own conscience, Roni only wanted to hide from the man she would surely have to face when the family gathered for cocktails.

What would Adam think upon seeing her?

And why the heck was she feeling guilty about it? She hadn’t followed him. In fact, if she’d known he was to be here, she would have gone to the ranch or somewhere equally far from this luxurious country estate.

Well, there was only one way to deal with a vindictive fate—meet it head-on and with your best foot forward.

Going to the closet, she removed the long black skirt and black jersey top with brilliant orange and gold poppies embroidered around the neckline. She added fire-coral earrings and tied her hair at the back of her neck with a thin, black ribbon.

She was more careful than usual in putting on makeup. She also decided on the sandals with the two-inch heels rather than the embroidered slippers she had planned to wear for the “at-home” evening. When she put her best foot forward, she wanted to appear as tall as possible.

“Roni, this is my stepmother, Danielle. You’ve met my father,” Scott said, escorting her to the older couple who stood beside a mobile tea cart in the library. “Dad, you remember Roni Dalton, don’t you? She was the consultant who wrote the computer program for the company orientation project that was such a success.”

Charles Masterson shook hands with her. “Of course I remember. Nice to see you again.”

It had been almost three months since she’d completed that task. During the interim she’d seen Scott four or five times for dinner, but not during the past month due to work. After refusing other invitations, she hadn’t had the heart to say no to this weekend. Now more than ever she wished she had.

“A computer consultant,” Danielle Masterson said. “How interesting. I took several computer courses while studying for my accounting degree and found them fascinating.”

Roni managed to keep her mouth from gaping at this statement. She had assumed the woman had been Mr. Masterson’s assistant or secretary or something like that.

The woman gave a little laugh. “Did you think I was a social butterfly? I was a financial officer at the company for a year before Charles and I married. That’s how we met.”

“I see,” Roni said, wondering if the woman had gotten her claws into Charles while he was deep in grief over his wife’s tragic death.

Maybe she was being unfair. Danielle could obviously make her own way in the world without snagging a rich husband. Although extra money always came in handy, she thought with a cynical attitude new to her.

After she and Scott were supplied with glasses of white and red wine respectively, they moved on.

“This is my sister, Geena,” Scott continued, directing her attention to the other couple in the room. “And her guest, Adam Smith.”

Roni had spotted him as soon as they entered the library. The smile remained on his mouth, but the look she got from those cool gray eyes told her he wasn’t pleased.

She mentally shrugged. He hadn’t informed her of his social calendar, so how was she to know he would be here? And why was he?

His sister worried about his love life, or lack thereof, and Roni had flirted outrageously with him over the past year. He’d watched her every maneuver with sardonic amusement and great detachment. Most of the time. There had been that one kiss…

Anyway, she knew he wasn’t the kind to get emotionally involved. Unless he’d really fallen for the fair Geena?

The thought was so painful, she had to press a hand against her tummy to stop the tumult. Last Christmas, he’d made it clear by his indifference that he wasn’t, and never would be, interested in her. Her New Year’s resolution had been to enjoy life and stop daydreaming about one stubborn FBI agent who traveled fast, far and alone.

However, March had come and with it, the kiss, which had burned clear down to her soul and filled her with such dreams, such longing. Her resolve to forget him had gone up in smoke.

He’d left the ranch and she hadn’t heard from him until their encounter last Friday. If not for that, she wouldn’t have known he was in town.

So be it. Since he was using his real name, she wouldn’t have to guard her tongue every moment of the weekend, assuming he was staying until Sunday as she was. Now she waited to see if he acknowledged they knew each other or if they were going to pretend to be strangers.

“Roni and I are old friends,” Adam said with casual ease. “In fact, we’re almost relatives. My sister is married to her cousin.” His smile was all innocent warmth.

“I’m glad to meet you,” Roni said to Geena.

She almost laughed at her own earlier vanity in trying to appear taller, as if that might make her more commanding or something. The lovely Geena, wearing three-inch heels, was on level with Adam’s six-foot height. Scott was an inch taller than the other two.

As with her family—all the Dalton males tended to be tall and lean—she felt like the odd man, uh, person, out. However, she had learned long ago not to be intimidated by size or any other facet of human differences.

“It is a small world,” Geena commented when the group was seated in a pleasant arrangement before the library fireplace. “Adam didn’t mention relatives in the city.”

“My sister and her husband live in the Hells Canyon area north of here,” Adam said.

“So you’ve known Roni a long time?” the other woman asked.

“Only about a year, actually.”

Geena turned to Roni. “Is your brother in finance?”

“He’s a deputy sheriff. And he raises and trains cutting horses. Prize cutting horses,” she added for no good reason except she wanted this high-class female to know they had some good bloodlines, too, even if it was in the stock they raised.

Again, laughter nearly escaped her before she could sternly clamp down on herself. Geena probably wouldn’t be amused at the comparison.

When Adam gave her a narrow-eyed scrutiny, Roni returned it with a wide-eyed innocence, her smile as sweet as molasses taffy. He lofted one thick dark eyebrow sardonically, then turned the conversation to a business topic with Mr. Masterson.

At seven o’clock, they went into the dining room for a dinner that lasted until eight-thirty. The talk around the table ranged from the stock market to politics and the campaigns that were already being waged for elections that were months, or even years, away. Roni mostly listened.

Adam mentioned that another Dalton cousin was married to a woman whose father was running for governor. Drawn into the conversation, she reported that his campaign seemed to be going well and he was ahead in the polls.

After dinner, the two older couples played bridge while she and Scott selected CDs of soft music and chatted quietly. By eleven o’clock she could hardly keep her eyes open.

“We’d better call it a night before Cinderella turns into a pumpkin,” Adam said in amusement as she tried to hide another yawn. “The Daltons are an ‘early to bed, early to rise’ family. I learned that on my first visit to the ranch when Roni woke me up at six in the morning for breakfast. I had agreed to ride out with them on a roundup and a picnic in the mountains for some weird reason I can’t recall.”

That brought chuckles from the group as the family gazed from Adam to her.

“Scott, show Roni the breakfast room,” the stepmother told him. She smiled cordially at Roni. “I’ll tell the housekeeper to be sure the coffee is ready by six. Is there anything special you would like to eat?”

“No, cereal or toast is fine,” Roni replied.

Geena’s smile wasn’t quite as friendly when Roni bid them good-night and left the room with Scott at her side. After guiding her to the breakfast room, he led the way up the stairs. She ducked inside her bedroom before he could give her a kiss.

Alone, she dropped the good-natured pose. Curving her fingers into claws, she gave a throaty growl at her image in the mirror over the fireplace, then spoiled the effect by sticking her tongue out at herself.

Fighting a vague sense of despair, she smiled ruefully at her childish display and prepared for bed. Once settled for the night with the lamp off, she found her eyes refused to close or her mind to stop going around and around with fragments of thought. She hoped the weekend would go by fast. Or that Adam would have to leave in the morning.

Next she wondered where he was sleeping…and if he was alone in the bed.

“Arggghhh,” she groaned and pulled the pillow over her head as if that would block out the hateful images that sprang into her mental vision.

In the morning, Roni polished off an English muffin with strawberry preserves, drank the last swallow of milk and wondered what she should do with her dishes.

Adam strolled in, wearing khaki slacks and a chambray shirt with the sleeves rolled up on his forearms. “I thought you would be up.”

“Yes. I nearly always wake when the sun comes up.”

He nodded as he went to the buffet and looked over the selection of hot and cold foods. Scrambled eggs and bacon were kept warm in a silver double boiler, a smaller version of those she’d seen at hotel buffets. The heat came from a tiny can of fuel of a type she’d used while camping.

The memory of another morning rushed into her mind like the rays of the rising sun that warmed the earth…

She and Adam had leaned on the fence and watched the horses munch hay from a rolled bale. A cool breeze blew down the valley from He-Devil peak. Most of the snow was gone from the pasture due to an unusually warm winter. With the coming of March, the storm pattern had changed, and snow was predicted by Monday, which was only two days away.

“You’d better head south,” she’d told him, “before the storm gets here. The county roads will be closed if we get a heavy snow.”

“Anxious to get rid of me?” he’d drawled.

She’d hated the amusement in his eyes, the way he had of treating her like a child when she was twentysix and had been making her own way since graduating from high school.

While Uncle Nick had helped so she hadn’t had to go into debt, she’d earned most of her way through college via a work-study program at the education company where she was now employed. She hadn’t felt truly young and carefree in years, maybe not since her father had died the winter before she’d turned four.

“Yes,” she’d answered. “You bother me in ways I don’t like. Because I seem to have no control over myself when you’re near.”

He sucked in a strangled breath.

She smiled wryly. “That got a reaction out of you.”

Suddenly he was close, too close for her comfort range. “Was that all you wanted—to get a reaction from me?” he demanded with an intensity she’d rarely seen in him.

He’d always kept them on a maddening level of casual amusement, as if he silently laughed at the attraction she was sure existed between them.

“No,” she said honestly. “No, I want more.”

She held her ground with an effort, refusing to look away from the gaze that was no longer cool, no longer amused. A tremor shook her as he came closer.

“Be careful what you wish for,” he warned, his voice soft, the tone harsh.

Once she’d wished her mother was alive, that her father would miraculously reappear, that Aunt Milly and Tink would come home, that the other orphans wouldn’t move on to high school and college and leave her behind…so many things she’d wished for. None had ever come true.

“I gave up on wishes long ago,” she said and heard the echo of sadness in the words. “Except maybe for this.”

Then she did a foolish thing. She kissed him.

His arms swept around her and lifted her off her feet. Raising her legs, she wrapped them around his strong masculine frame while her arms encircled his shoulders. She held on as a storm of passion swept over them, through them, as strong in him as it was in her.

It was wonderful and frightening, fulfilling and yet not enough, too many things for her to think about. She quit trying and simply let the hunger take her.

When he slid his hand under her coat, then her sweater, she shivered with delight. His touch was cool at first, but soon warmed as he explored from her neck to her waist, stopping when he touched the top of her jeans.

She pulled back and turned ever so slightly.

It was enough of an invitation. He cupped one hand under her, lifting her onto the rail where cowboys once tied their horses. Now they were at eye level. He slipped both hands under the bulky sweater she wore, caressing upward until he came to her breasts. His thumbs stroked across the tips, which seemed ultrasensitive under the thin barrier of lace she’d worn that morning.

Sensation plunged through her, as wild as a mustang fresh off the range. She hadn’t known longing could be like this, or that pleasure could be so strong it bordered on pain. She gasped his name.

He kissed the word from her lips, pulled the breath out of her body with his mouth.

But she didn’t need air now, only his touch. She was all dancing flames, burning wild and out of control across the windy plain that was her soul. Her heart was engulfed in the magic of his fiery embrace.

And then he was gone.

She stared in confusion as he pivoted and turned his back to her. “Adam?”

From six feet away, he faced her, his expression so grim, so filled with disgust, her heart felt as if it had been turned into ice.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “That shouldn’t have happened. I never meant to let it go that far.”

“It was wonderful. Why should you be sorry?”

“Because I can’t afford to get involved with you.”

She smiled because it was obviously too late to worry about that.

He shook his head, fury in his eyes. “Because when it was over, we would still have relatives who are married to each other and that could be awkward.”

“Why should it be over?” she challenged. “Maybe we’ll fall madly in love, marry and live happily ever after.”

“It won’t happen,” he said, as if he had a crystal ball. “My work is dangerous. I can’t afford to lose my concentration by worrying about a family.”

“I see,” she said, forcing a quietness into her manner that she was far from feeling. She’d learned long ago that men responded to calm and withdrew from tears.

“There’s an attraction, a strong one,” he admitted, “but that’s as far as it goes. I’m not in love with you, and I’m not going to be.”

His words echoed inside her where she felt as hollow as a cave. “You’ve made yourself perfectly clear.”

Too proud to let him see the hurt, she smiled, jumped down from the railing and walked into the ranch house.

Hearing her uncle Nick in the kitchen, she stayed in her room until she was totally composed, then she went to help him with breakfast. The next morning Adam was gone when she rose. His sister’s lack of surprise later that day told Roni he’d explained his plans to Honey, but not to her.

Only her older brother had known of her feelings. Seth would keep a secret to the grave, so she didn’t have to fear pitying glances from the rest of the family.

For the present, she only had to get through the rest of this weekend, then she could go home and privately lick the wounds that hadn’t quite healed.

Observing Adam as he set his plate on the table and took the seat opposite her, she wondered at the madness that had seized them both that day. March madness, she thought, recalling Alice and her trip through Wonderland.

“What’s funny?” Adam asked, shaking pepper generously over his scrambled eggs.

Her whimsical smile grew. “I was wondering what it is about March that makes rabbits go mad.” At his quizzical glance, she added, “Don’t you remember the saying—mad as a March hare?”

He replaced the pepper shaker on the table with a thump. “I was wondering when you would bring that up.”

“I wasn’t referring to us.”

“Like hell you weren’t.”

She returned his glare, her stubborn nature coming to her rescue. At that moment she wanted to drive him mad with frustration as he tried to figure her out but couldn’t.

She hoped.

He caught her wrist. Surprised, she let him take her pulse, which was now pounding in her head. She counted the beats as he did. Dropping her hand, he picked up his knife.

“What’s your diagnosis, doctor?” she inquired.

His smile was challenging. “Fast and sassy.”

She raised her eyebrows at that. “I have a sassy pulse?”

He looked up from buttering a muffin. “You have a sassy mouth,” he said, his voice dropping to a deeper note. “And a sharp tongue that could very well get you into trouble one day. Your relatives should have warned you about that.”

She had to laugh. “Well, actually, they have. Many times. Many, many times,” she said truthfully.

After a second, he laughed, too.

Now that he was in better humor, there was something she needed to know. She leaned toward him and spoke in a near whisper. “Are you here socially, or are you on a case?”

He was silent so long she thought he wasn’t going to answer. Finally he gave a sardonic half smile. “Since you know the family, I suppose you’ll ferret out my secrets before the weekend is over. I’m on a case.”

She ignored the relief she felt at this information. “Uh, what should I know about you? Do you have a cover?”

“I’m in the equipment leasing business and may be doing some work with their company. This is a relatively new endeavor for me, so you don’t know anything about it.”

“I’ll follow your lead,” she promised.

He gave a frankly amused snort.

On that cheerful note, Geena entered the room. She wore white slacks and a white silk shirt with turquoise stones around her neck and dangling from her earrings. Her summer-blond hair was sleek and held back from her face with a black band. She looked like a princess.

After daintily covering a yawn, she glanced at the couple with a smile. “You two are in good humor this morning.”

“Join us,” Adam invited, rising and holding a chair for her. “Coffee?”

“Please.”

He brought her a steaming cup of the delicious gourmet blend, then inquired about her preferences in food. Roni tried not to get angry about his attentiveness as he served Geena the single slice of toast she’d requested and placed the container of marmalade close at hand.

“My, aren’t we the gentleman this morning?” she said and immediately regretted the acid drip on her tongue.

“I’ve always found Adam to be perfectly charming.” Geena smiled into Adam’s eyes, her sexy perusal meant for him alone.

Roni experienced the uncomfortable feeling a person got when with others who obviously would have preferred that she disappear so they could have privacy.

Her chin went up. She gazed out at the lawn. “Are you two going to play tennis this morning?”

“I thought we would go for a walk by the river. There are some beautiful rose arbors on the estate.” She glanced at Roni. “You might enjoy them, too.”

“No, thanks. Roses make me sneeze.”

Adam frowned at that, but Roni didn’t change her story. He was probably recalling all the flowers in her yard. Well, she did take allergy pills when ragweed was in season. At any rate, Scott was her host. She would wait for him.

Thirty minutes later, the couple left her at the table. She watched them cross the tennis court and stroll down the sloping lawn. Geena slipped her hand into the crook of his arm before they disappeared among the trees that lined the river.

At nine, Mr. Masterson appeared, gulped down a cup of coffee, then headed out for a golf game. He told her his wife took breakfast in her room and answered her mail in the mornings, that his son didn’t usually get up before ten on the weekend and that she should feel free to watch television, read or do whatever she wished until they all met for lunch at one at the country club.

He was a nice man, she reflected after he left. Going to the other room, she read financial magazines until Scott appeared. “Shall we see if we can catch up with the other two?” he asked, bringing a muffin and glass of orange juice to the library with him.

“Sure.”

They headed for the river as soon as he finished. There they found Adam and Geena sitting on a bench beneath a bower of white roses. They were just about to kiss, or so it seemed to Roni.

“Hey,” Scott said, not at all embarrassed at coming upon the other couple. “Knock it off, you two. It’s too early for that sort of thing.”

The older couple laughed as they leisurely drew back. Roni indicated the stain on Adam’s jaw near his mouth. “Is that your favorite shade of lipstick for daytime wear?” she teased, hiding an unwarranted possessiveness. Adam wasn’t hers. And never would be, according to him.

His eyes met hers. For a second she thought she saw regret in those gray depths and something that seemed warm and sensual and concerned. Then the impression was gone.

He might be here on a case, but that didn’t mean his reactions to Geena weren’t sincere. The thought hurt, but she had to face it. The other woman was lovely, smart and sophisticated. Why wouldn’t Adam be attracted to her?

He wiped his hand across his face and glanced at the resultant smear. “Yes, I think it is.” His grin at Geena was sexy and intimate.

Geena removed a tissue from her pocket and gently wiped the color away. “There,” she said. “Now we won’t embarrass our young guest.”

Roni rejected the comparison to a child coming upon a grown-up game she didn’t understand. She understood all too well. The other woman was marking her territory.




Chapter Three


A fter a morning of hiking around the beautiful estate, Adam showered and dressed in fresh khakis and a white polo shirt for the planned luncheon at the country club. He gave a silent whistle upon meeting Geena in the library.

“Very nice,” he murmured, ignoring the slight pout to her lips that indicated she would like a kiss. Maybe the weekend visit hadn’t been so smart, although it was part of the plan that he should distract the daughter of the house while Greg got Mr. Masterson’s approval for the bogus leasing agreements with the fake company Adam represented.

Since Geena knew he was with the FBI and had helped him set up the sting operation, he thought she was taking the friendly pretense a bit far. He hoped she wasn’t making plans for the two of them for when the case was resolved.

“Thank you, sir,” she said demurely, then laughed.

She wore white slacks with tiny gold stripes and a golden-colored, clingy blouse that crossed over her breasts and tied in the back at her waist. An enticing bit of tanned flesh was visible at her waist. Her gold sandals had three-inch heels, putting her at eye level with him.

He’d always liked his women tall and elegant, he grimly reminded himself. Until he’d met a certain small tomboyish woman who’d shown him the sweetest passion he’d ever known.

Hearing voices from the stairs, Geena picked up her purse, extracted her sunglasses and glanced impatiently toward the corridor. “Are you two ready?” she asked.

Scott and Roni entered the room. Her brother checked the clock. “Yes, we’re right on time.”

Adam noted the not quite concealed irritation in the other man. Scott and Geena, like many brothers and sisters, didn’t get along all that well.

Had circumstances been different, he and Honey might have been at odds, but with the difference in their ages and the fact that they’d had only each other while growing up, they were close. He suddenly missed her.

He wanted to question her about falling in love, about taking a chance on another person, about trusting in luck for once and a gut feeling that he should take what life offered and run with it.

Then what? What came next? Marriage and happily ever after, as Roni so confidently proclaimed?

Upon this odd note, he let himself look at Roni. His heart started pounding, as it had last week at her cottage.

She wore a short white skirt and a formfitting white top with blue sleeves and collar. Like Geena, the top and bottom didn’t quite meet, exposing a midsection of smooth flesh. A gold ring with a tiny cross dangling from it pierced the edge of her navel.

His lungs stopped working.

He stared at the bit of gold as it shifted constantly with each movement, each breath she took. He thought of kissing her there, of stripping the skirt from her perfect form and tasting the delectable flesh—

He broke the thought and held his arm out to Geena. “Shall we go?”

They followed the other couple to Scott’s car. He forced himself to think of winter snow and icy dips in the river until the fever left his blood.

On the short trip to the country club, he was mostly silent while the two women chatted. Anger—with himself for his lack of control, with his job for bringing him to this place and with the unfairness of life for making him long for things he couldn’t have—burned in the pit of his stomach. As soon as he finished the current task, he would request a transfer back to LA.

Fat chance, some snide part of him whispered. The division manager had wanted him out of the LA area after they broke that case so he’d be safe from vengeful cops.

Safe?

Glancing at Roni’s dark, gleaming hair in the front seat, he experienced a sinking sensation. He could have gone to New Mexico on a drug smuggling bust. Why had he chosen to come here?

“You’re quiet,” Geena murmured, leaning close. “Deep, dark thoughts?”

“Very deep, very dark,” he said with a wicked smile.

She shivered delicately. “Mmm, sounds delicious.”

When she laid a possessive hand on his knee, he didn’t pull away. Instead he clasped it in his and held it as they pulled into a parking space at the club. Through the side mirror, he met Roni’s eyes. They watched each other for a second as if sizing up an opponent, then she looked away.

He felt as if he’d taken a cheap shot at her. He quickly got out and went around to Geena’s side to open her door. Damn, but it was going to be a long weekend.

Halfway through lunch Roni was relieved to see Patricia on the last hole of the golfing green. When her friend finished the game, she stripped off her gloves, spotted Roni and her group, waved madly, then came over. Roni had told her to look for them.

The three men stood.

“Please, gentlemen, keep your seats,” Patricia told them. “I just stopped to say hello to Roni. We were roommates in college. She got me through those awful computer courses.”

“Patricia corrected all my English papers before I turned them in, or else I would still be trying to graduate,” Roni said, returning the implied compliment.

Adam invited Patricia to take his chair and pulled another over from an empty table. The day was sunny, so they had opted to sit on the dining terrace. Roni introduced her friend to the Masterson family and to Adam.

“Upjohn?” Charles repeated the last name. “There’s a Thomas Upjohn who lives in the area.”

Patricia wrinkled her nose prettily. “My father. I work in the loan department at the bank. Since he has no son, he’s decided I need to learn the family business.”

“She’s a whiz at it,” Roni said loyally. “She arranged the loan for my house and got me through all the paperwork. Even Seth approved of the transaction.”

She had to explain Seth was her brother and an attorney and that he reviewed all the family legal affairs.

“I know him,” the older Masterson told her. “He brought a suit against my company for a client and won. It was a business matter,” he added with a smile. “No hard feelings.”

Roni nodded.

Patricia ordered a glass of iced tea when the waiter came over, then settled in to chat with them. Roni felt more at ease with her friend there. She’d been to the country club with Patricia on other occasions, and it was nice to have reinforcements, so to speak.

Not that everything wasn’t just fine, at least as far as she was concerned, she mused when attention shifted away from her. There was tension between Scott and Geena. She thought the brother and sister didn’t like each other very much. Geena had probably bossed Scott around when they were kids, the same as her brothers and cousins had always tried to do to her.

She’d hated being ordered about. Except by Uncle Nick, of course. He was the undisputed boss of the Dalton gang.

Her heart warmed as she thought of the relative who’d taken the orphans in and given them shelter and a loving home. That aspect of him had never changed, not even when his own heart was aching with the loss of his wife and child not quite a year after the orphans had come to live with him and Aunt Milly and Tink.

With only a few months difference in their ages, she and Tink had become fast friends. It had been so nice to have another girl to play with. Then Tink was gone, leaving another hole in her heart…

She realized the others were looking at her. “I’m sorry. What was the question?”

“Shall I see if we can get a tee time for this afternoon?” Geena asked. “There may be a cancellation.”

“I don’t play golf, but you three go ahead.”

“We don’t mind helping you,” Geena offered graciously. “It’s easy to learn.”

Roni grimaced to herself. It looked as if she was going to have to join them.

“Actually,” Patricia spoke up, “Roni has played a few rounds with me. She’s not bad for a beginner, but watch out for her wicked slice.”

Roni couldn’t recall if a slice meant she hit the ball to the right while a hook went to the left or vice versa.

Geena rose. “Then it’s settled. I’ll check with the pro and see if we can get a slot.”

Roni had a feeling she wasn’t going to enjoy this game at all. “When did you learn to play?” she asked Adam.

“I used to caddy when I was in high school. Sometimes I was asked to fill out a foursome.”

“I see.”

Charles and Danielle apologized and left them shortly after that. Patricia gave Roni’s arm a squeeze and said she had to run. She was in charge of a political dinner that evening for her father, for whom she often served as hostess.

Growing up without a mother had been an immediate bond between the two girls when they’d shared a room their freshman year at school, then an apartment thereafter. Patricia came from a wealthy banking family, but she was friendly and candid and casual about her background.

Scott saw a friend and excused himself, leaving her and Adam at the table. Roni sipped iced tea and observed the next group of golfers at the eighteenth hole.

“Scared?” Adam said.

“Of what?”

He shrugged. “Of looking like an amateur on the golf course. You Daltons don’t like to lose.”

“Well, I hate to have Geena show me up,” she admitted, bringing an unexpected smile to his face, “but I’ll live through it.”

“Good.”

A funny feeling invaded the pit of her stomach at his approving nod. “Uncle Nick said we should try new things as long as it wasn’t drugs or something illegal. Geena is probably an expert,” she added a trifle glumly.

His smile became a chuckle. “Probably. Just relax and try to enjoy it. Don’t worry about the score.”

“That’s easy for you to say.” She sighed loudly. “The grounds are nice here. If nothing else, I can admire the landscape while I’m hacking my way down the fairway.”

“Right.”

Her attitude lightened as he laughed again. Maybe she would get through this with her dignity intact. She vowed to do her best.

When Geena returned and reported they were scheduled for four o’clock, the problem of shoes came up. Determined not to be outdone by the other woman, Roni bought a pair of golfing shoes at the club. She carefully concealed her shock at the sticker price and put the cost on her credit card. She hoped Uncle Nick didn’t find out what she’d paid for them.

“They’ll last a long time,” Adam said, falling into step beside her as they went to the car where Scott waited.

“They’d better,” she said wryly.

Geena, on the other side of Adam, looked amused. “You can play in sneakers, too. Some people do.”

Her tone implied that those who did were social wash-outs. Roni smiled brightly. “It’s time I learned to play. Patricia loves it and is always after me to join her. Maybe I’ll get good enough to show her up.”

“What’s her handicap?” Geena wanted to know.

Roni hadn’t the foggiest idea. “Five.”

Geena looked surprised, then dubious.

“Maybe six,” Roni said, trying to look as if she knew what she was talking about.

“We’ll have to invite her to play sometime,” the other woman decided, a competitive light in her eyes.

Roni had thought Patricia was a wonderful player, but now she hoped her friend was pro material. She wanted to see someone beat the socks off the cool blonde, who seemed perfection personified. Maybe someday she would beat her, Roni mused, wondering how much golf lessons cost.

Glancing at Adam, who observed them with a slight frown on his handsome face, she hoped he didn’t realize she was seething from something very akin to jealousy. She didn’t like the feeling at all.

Roni lined up the borrowed driver behind the ball, eyed the flag on the pole at the last hole, then gave it her all. She observed as the ball went shooting off into the rough, hit, then, to her surprise, rolled onto the green. The far edge of the green, yes, but on the green, and this was only her second shot.

Geena—the cool, the skillful, the beautiful—drove straight down the fairway and landed in the middle of the green. Scott and Adam followed, then the foursome climbed in the golf cart and went to play the eighteenth hole.

Geena had played beyond her game, or so she said, and had given Adam a run for his money on the lovely course, coming in only two points behind him. Scott was ten points behind and obviously disgruntled about it. He was probably off his game due to having to play after her.

Her own score was so terrible, Roni saw no need to add it up. She’d lost two balls in the trees and two in water traps. Three times she’d had to pick up and move on without getting the stupid ball in the hole because other people were waiting for the green.

Adam’s handicap was nineteen. A handicap less than ten was considered close to pro status, so Geena had known that Roni had been talking through her hat when she’d claimed Patricia was in the five to six range.

Nothing like making a fool of oneself. She hadn’t been so humiliated since first grade when she’d forgotten the lines to the poem she’d written for Uncle Nick and he’d been in the audience to witness her failure.

“This is a difficult green,” Geena announced.

“Tell me about it,” Roni muttered.

Since she was the farthest from the hole, she walked to the edge of the green, stood at a tilt because the rough slanted downward there and, hardly glancing at the hole, gave the ball a whack with the putter Adam handed her. Three more whacks and she was done, even if she missed every time, she consoled her bruised ego.

The ball rolled merrily with the slope of the green. It was going to miss the hole. She pasted her cheeriest smile on her face. Stoic was her middle name.

Just then the ball swerved to the right. In a long graceful arc, it spiraled over the short grass in a tightening circle. To her amazement, it disappeared.

“A birdie,” Geena said. “I don’t believe it.”

Roni couldn’t believe it, either. She walked over to the hole and peered inside. The ball was there.

“Good going,” Adam said when she lifted it out of the cup. His eyes were filled with laughter.

She grinned at him, her world right once more. On this buoyant note, Roni made it through the casual dinner and the teasing she took over her score that evening.

During the evening meal, listening to Adam talk business with the Mastersons, she picked up on the fact that the family thought Adam was in some kind of communications leasing business, just as he’d said at breakfast. She also learned that Greg Williams was the chief financial officer of their company.

With a sudden sense of horror, it occurred to her that she might have blown Adam’s cover on his current case. She had to speak to him. Right away.

Roni paced the floor. Finally, at half past eleven, she heard Geena’s voice, then Adam’s, as they ascended the stairs. She eased her door open ever so little and noted which rooms they entered. As she’d suspected, their rooms were side by side, across the hall from hers and Scott’s.

At midnight, she figured everyone was in bed and asleep. Except Adam. She could see a sliver of light under his door. She tiptoed across the hall and silently turned the knob.

Adam, dressed in a sweat suit, sat in an easy chair, his feet on the matching ottoman, a book open on his lap. His eyes met hers, their frosty hue not very welcoming.

She slipped inside and closed the door. “I need to talk to you,” she whispered.

He nodded, but didn’t get up. His gaze swept over her satin pajamas, which were dark blue with a paisley print border in gold on the sleeves and legs.

Going to him, she perched on the edge of the ottoman and leaned close. “You remember a week ago Friday I was at the restaurant with Patricia and you were with—”

“GregWilliams,” Adam interrupted rather impatiently.

“Yes, well, you told him you and my cousin had worked on a couple of projects and that we had met at his wedding. Remember?”

He nodded.

“Then last night you mentioned Zack and Honey. I told Geena my cousin was a deputy sheriff—”

“Ah, yes, when you were comparing bloodlines.”

She flushed at the sarcastic tone and wished she hadn’t let her baser emotions get the better of her. “I don’t think Geena caught on,” she said contritely.

“Would it have mattered to you if she had?”

Roni peered into his unfriendly gaze. “Not then,” she admitted, “but now I’m truly sorry. I was envious, just for a moment, of all she had.”

The silence was brief, but intense.

“What, Little Bits, does she have that you haven’t got, tenfold?”

His voice was still stern, but other emotions—tenderness? sympathy? concern?—flicked through his eyes and were quickly hidden. She wondered if they were for her or for the confident Geena.

“Golfing skills,” she lamented.

He smiled slightly, and the tension eased. She grinned, then became serious. “Anyway, Mr. Masterson mentioned Greg Williams was with CTC,” she said in a barely audible voice.

“What bothers you about that?” Adam asked.

“I may have blown your cover.” She pinched pleats into the satin material of her pajamas while she considered the ramifications. “If Geena knows my cousin is a cop and Greg knows you’ve worked with him and they get to talking and all this comes out, then they may suspect you’re a cop.”

“I see.”

She stared at her nervous fingers and forced them to stop creasing the material. “I feel just wretched.”

His low laughter brought her head up. “I knew I was in for trouble when you fell on my table that day like a warning from heaven. I don’t know how I thought I could avoid you.” He laughed again. “Or your meddling.”

His resigned exasperation hurt, but she had no time for self-pity at the present. “Are you making fun of me?” she demanded. It certainly didn’t seem as if he was taking her all that seriously.

“No,” he denied, but he was smiling. “Next time you see Greg, flirt with him. Maybe he’ll tell you what he’s up to.”




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