Flirting With Temptation

“Jack, please.” He smiled at her. “It’s just some of the evidence that I told you about. We can talk about it over lunch.” He glanced at the nearby beltway that had begun to move. “If you’ll just point out your luggage, we’ll be on our way.”

Very smooth, Corie thought but she knew it was a lie. She was almost sure that Franco had been pressing him to tell her about Benny Lewis’s past.

“This is my luggage,” she said, indicating the duffel she was carrying.

Franco took it from her. “Then we’re off to lunch and after that to Lorenzo’s. He does my hair.” He gave her a little shove into the revolving doors.

When Jack joined her on the street, he said, “Franco says Lorenzo is the top choice of the Hollywood starlets when they come to town. And I told him that if you end up with spiked hair, I’ll have to kill him.”

She couldn’t prevent the laugh. And this time when she met his eyes, it was her stomach that seemed to lurch and then tighten. She threw all her effort into dragging her gaze away from his, and that was the only reason that she saw the man with the gun.

Later, she would recall the other details—that the man holding it was standing by the open door of a car, that he wore a hat and dark glasses and a dog sat patiently next to the white cane he was holding in his left hand. But, at the moment, all that fully registered in her mind was the gun.

A woman screamed. “He’s got a gun!”

“A gun!”

There was another scream and people at the curb began to scatter. As they cleared, Corie had enough time to see the man raise his hand and point the gun into the air. Then someone pushed her into Jack. It was like colliding with a brick wall.

“Get down,” she said.

The sound of the shot split the air, drowning out her words, but Jack was already shoving her to the ground.

3

“LORENZO WILL SQUEEZE YOU IN AT TWO,” Franco announced, closing his cell phone and signaling a waitress. “When Cameron Diaz was late for an appointment, he made her wait three days before he rescheduled.” Pausing, he leaned closer to Corie. “Thank heavens I knew him when he was Billy Lawrence from Trenton.”

Jack leaned back in his chair as a waitress slapped down three menus.

“Three Irish coffees,” Franco ordered before anyone could speak. Then he turned to Corie. “It’s the house specialty. They claim credit for originating the drink here in the U.S., and a shot of strong Irish whiskey will do us all good after that unfortunate incident at the airport.”

Unfortunate incident? Jack studied the two people at the table and stifled the urge to pinch himself. Franco punched more numbers into his cell phone, and Corie stared out the window of the café, looking for all the world like Eliza Doolittle getting her first glimpse of Henry Higgins’s world. Was he the only one who was worried about the “blind” gunman who had shot at them at the airport?

Both Franco and Corie had gotten a look at the shooter. Franco had noticed that the shooter had been wearing a fedora and a tan trench coat. Corie had described the gunman as an older man wearing sunglasses with a white cane and she’d caught just a glimpse of a small, fluffy dog.

The moment she’d spoken the words white cane and dog to the policeman, the hairs on the back of his neck had sprung to attention. Could it have been the same man he’d seen earlier at Pier 39—and later in the car that had backfired in front of his apartment building? That was the question that had been plaguing him as Franco had bundled them into his SUV and driven them to Fisherman’s Wharf. Jack wished that he’d gotten a look at the shooter, but he’d been so focused on getting Corie out of the line of fire, he hadn’t been any help at all. What were the chances of seeing two older men with sunglasses, white canes and dogs in one morning? Ordinarily, Jack didn’t believe in coincidences, but in this case the incident was so…bizarre.

And it had all happened so fast. Even now, his memory of the shooting came in flashes—the deafening sound of the shot, the fear he’d felt when Corie crashed into him, screams and then the screech of tires. He hadn’t seen the gunman at all.

Was he crazy to think that the “blind” man had been shooting at Corie? She’d told the police that the man had fired straight into the air, and several other witnesses had corroborated her account. However, his instincts—the ones that seemed to be operating overtime when it came to Corie—told him not to exclude the possibility that Corie might be in danger. But he didn’t have one shred of evidence, and the police were going with the theory that the gunman was a crackpot who’d fired blindly over the heads of the crowd. That was the slant that Jack had taken when he’d phoned the story into the Chronicle. The afternoon headline would read Blind Gunman Causes Havoc At Airport.

Franco flipped his cell phone closed with a flourish. “Mission accomplished. Marlo, my friend at Macy’s, is rescheduling your fashion consultation for five. That will put a little pressure on Lorenzo, but he’s a genius.” He beamed a smile at Corie. “By tonight, you won’t recognize yourself. We’ll go out on the town to celebrate. There’s a great new place in the neighborhood, Club Nuevo. Lots of singles hang out there.”

“Maybe Corie would like to rest,” Jack said.

“Nonsense.” Corie and Franco spoke in unison and then grinned at each other.

Jack found that the exchange made him feel like an outsider. More than that, it made him feel…jealous?

That was ridiculous. But perhaps not as ridiculous as the fact that he was attracted to Corie Benjamin. The moment that he’d taken her hand and looked into her eyes, he’d felt the pull—basic, elemental. And he’d wondered what it might be like between them. Hell, he was wondering what it might be like to make love to her right now. And that was more than ridiculous. It was impossible. He was responsible for her now that he’d gotten her to come to San Francisco. And she might be in danger. He was definitely not going to act on any attraction he felt for Corie Benjamin.

“Look, Corie.” Franco pointed to the bar. “You don’t want to miss the way they make the Irish coffees here.”

Corie turned in the direction that Franco was pointing. The bartender had a row of glass cups in front of him. With one hand he added whiskey to each and with the other a dollop of whipped cream. She might have enjoyed watching the ritual more if she hadn’t been so aware of Jack sitting next to her. Every time he looked at her, prickles of heat raced along her skin and triggered a strange and rather pleasant tightening in her stomach. The sensations were even stronger now than when she’d first looked into his eyes at the airport. She’d never experienced anything like this before.

Jet lag. That had to be it. But she couldn’t help remembering what it had felt like to lie beneath him for those few moments on the sidewalk at the airport. The press of his body against hers, as impersonal as it had been, had set her mind wondering and her body wanting.

Definitely jet lag. He’d never given her any indication that he was attracted to her. As a ripple of applause began at the bar, she stole a quick look at Jack. Up close, he was much more attractive than he’d been on his book cover. Though it shocked her, she found that she couldn’t look at that longish dark hair without wanting to run her hands through it. And she had to clasp her hands tightly in front of her to control the urge to touch that lean, tanned face.

Her gaze dropped to his mouth. His lips were thin, masculine, and set in a grim line. Something tightened inside of her, and she could almost feel what it might be like to have those lips pressed against hers. They would be hard, demanding…

Wrenching her gaze away, Corie stared out the window until her heart slid back out of her throat and stopped beating like a bass drum. If she’d been alone, she would have taken out her notebook and tried to doodle her way to some understanding of what she was feeling. Then again, if she were alone, she wouldn’t be feeling this way, and she was beginning to like it. The man she’d had an affair with in college hadn’t even once made her feel the way she did when she just looked at Jack Kincaid. She risked another quick glance, but Jack was looking at Franco. Her heart sank. Could Jack be having the same thoughts about Franco that she was having about Jack? When a strange bitter-tasting flavor filled her mouth, Corie blinked.

Could it be jealousy she was feeling? Ridiculous. There wasn’t a chance in the world that Jack Kincaid could be attracted to her. Besides, hadn’t she read somewhere that all the best men were gay? So it was hopeless anyway.

“Enjoy,” the woman said as she delivered their coffees and hurried on to the next table.

“To Corie’s San Francisco adventure,” Franco said, raising his glass.

Jack didn’t lift his. “We have to talk.”

Corie and Franco both turned to him.

“Am I the only one who’s at all worried about the shooting incident at the airport?”

Franco’s eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?”

“I don’t like the timing.” Pausing, Jack rubbed the back of his neck. “I’ve been thinking it over, and it’s possible that the shooter was aiming at Corie.”

Franco whipped out his notebook. “A blind hit man. What a plot point!”

Corie set down her coffee. “He fired the bullet into the air. I saw him and so did several other witnesses. The police concluded he was just some crazy person.”

Jack gave Franco an annoyed look before returning his gaze to Corie’s. “I have a feeling—the same one I get whenever something I’m working on is about to go bad. And I just want to cover all the possibilities so that we can take precautions. It’s possible that someone in the Lewis family might not be too thrilled that you’re here.”

Corie’s expression became thoughtful as she considered it for a moment. “True. But how did the Lewis family know I was arriving today?”

“The person who e-mailed me your whereabouts could also be feeding the Lewises the same information,” Jack said.

“Okay. But if they’re so worried, why did they send a blind hit man to shoot at me?”

“Good point,” Franco said and made a note.

“Okay,” Jack raised both hands, palms out. “You’ve got logic on your side there. But what if the white cane and the dark glasses were a disguise? Maybe he could see perfectly well, and he just dressed that way to get close to you or to make sure that he couldn’t be identified.”

“He’s got a point,” Franco remarked as he scribbled on the page.

“Let me get this straight. He could see perfectly?” Corie asked with a smile. “So perfectly that he aimed his bullet into the air and completely missed me.”