The Dare

Her heartbeat had just returned to normal when above the piano music drifting out of the overhead speaker, she heard a deep voice. A man’s voice. With a sinking feeling in her stomach, Rory whirled away from the mirror and dropped to her knees. Then she jiggled the slats in the door to get a look. Black boots, black jeans and the bottom of a black leather jacket. The Terminator.

He’d come for her.

Her mind racing as fast as her heart, she rose and pressed her back against the door. A plan. That’s what she needed. Maybe there was a back way out of the shop. She opened the door and took a quick look. He was facing Irene across a glass-and-chrome counter, and she was talking on the phone.

Just looking at him in profile had that strange little zing of awareness shooting along her nerve endings again. Escape, she reminded herself. You’re looking for a way out.

A quick look in the other direction dashed any hope she had of getting away. The back of the shop was a solid wall. Ducking back into her dressing room, she leaned against the door.

And then it struck her. She was thinking of running away, and that wasn’t what she wanted to do. This was her chance to negotiate that interview.

To calm her nerves, she focused once more on her image in the mirror. To her surprise she looked even sexier. Her skin was flushed. Somehow, she looked taller, her legs appeared to be longer, her breasts fuller.

In short, she looked like a woman who could get what she wanted.

And she wanted more than the interview. She wanted the Terminator. The awareness that she’d felt the moment she’d looked into his eyes was back—and it was growing. Her insides had begun to melt the moment she’d seen him again. And there was a growing ache right in her center. Rory pressed her hand against her stomach.

Get a grip, she told herself. This was no time to let some pricey undergarments turn her into a nymphomaniac. Nor was it time to become muddled about her objective. The interview. She had to talk to the Terminator and convince him to set up the interview with Jared Slade.

She grabbed her jeans—but first she had to get dressed.

The bell over the shop rang.

Dropping the jeans, Rory tensed, holding her breath.

He was leaving. She had to stop him. She moved to the door, opened it and stepped out.

But it wasn’t Irene Malinowitz’s back that she saw at the door to the shop. It was the Terminator’s.

“I’ll take care of everything, Irene,” he said.

She heard the door close, the lock click. Then he turned to face her.

For the second time in one morning—perhaps in her life—Rory felt her mind go perfectly blank. She couldn’t identify one thought—there were too many sensations cart-wheeling through her. Heat. Cold. Nerves. And an electric spark of lust. He was walking toward the dressing room with the same purposefulness in his stride he’d had when he’d moved across the lobby.

He was coming after her.

This time she wasn’t going to run.

THE MOMENT HE TURNED AWAY from locking the door to Silken Fantasies, Hunter Marks felt his body go absolutely still. She was standing right outside the dressing-room door, and as his gaze raked over that creamy, porcelain-smooth skin, those wispy bits of red lace, and the incredibly long legs, he felt his head begin to spin. He moved then, almost as if he were being drawn by a magnet.

There was something about her. He’d thought of her as an elf or a pixie. But standing there right now, she looked like an exotic dancer in a high-priced strip club. Was it the elf or the sex goddess who was drawing him?

Or was it something else? She wasn’t trying to escape; she hadn’t even made a move to cover herself. And there’d been that moment in the lobby of Les Printemps—just before she’d bolted—when her gaze had met his and he hadn’t seen a trace of fear in her eyes.

Courage was a rare commodity, and Hunter had always admired it when he saw it. Was that why she pulled at him? As he drew closer, he ran his eyes over her again. Or was his attraction to her merely an incredible trick of chemistry? Whatever caused it, he couldn’t look at her without wondering what it would be like to touch her—to taste her and touch her until she was slick and wet and hot for him.

His body heated, hardened, as he imagined what it might be like to slip inside of her and feel her close around him like a moist, tight fist.

Hunter stopped short when he was still a few feet away from her. For one chilling moment, he realized that if he allowed himself to get any closer, he would touch her. Kiss her. Pull her to the floor of the shop and—

Ruthlessly, he shoved the pImages** out of his mind and tried to replace them with some semblance of rational thought. Even as a voice at the back of his mind whispered, Take her, he struggled to recall why he’d followed her in here. What did he want from Rory Gibbs?

“I’ll give you the film on one condition,” she said.

The film. Hunter’s eyes narrowed. His brain was starving for blood while hers was clicking along at full speed. He watched her chew on her bottom lip.

Nerves. It gave him some satisfaction to realize that the sex goddess wasn’t quite as cool and pulled together as she appeared to be. This close, he could see that her eyes were a deep, golden amber, the color of well-aged whiskey. He could see the flicker of nerves there, too. And he could smell the faint scent of cherry-flavored bubble gum. He managed to keep his gaze from returning to her lips.

“Don’t you want to know what the condition is?” she asked.

The condition. Once more, Hunter found himself admiring her for keeping her mind on business. She didn’t even seem to be conscious of the fact that she was conducting negotiations while wearing next to nothing. But she wasn’t indifferent to him. Through the sheer red fabric covering her breasts, he could see that her nipples were hard little berries. And a pulse was beating at her throat. Thoroughly intrigued, he let himself wonder for a moment—what might it take to taste her right there?

But that wasn’t what he’d followed her into Silken Fantasies to do. Annoyance flared—not with her but with himself. He’d dealt with a lot of women in his life—family members, business acquaintances, lovers, and even some enemies—but he’d never met one who could cloud his mind the way this particular one could.

“What’s your condition?” he asked.

She briefly chewed her bottom lip again, then said, “I work for Celebs magazine, and I want an exclusive interview with Jared Slade.”

Not going to happen. And nothing she could have said would have more quickly catapulted him out of the fantasies he was building. She was a reporter, Hunter reminded himself, and he felt his body and his mind finally begin to cool.

He extended his hand, palm upward. “I’ll take the camera.”

She hesitated. “He hasn’t agreed to the interview yet.”

“First, I’ll develop the film and see what you’ve got to negotiate with,” he said.

She frowned at him. “If you take the film, I won’t have anything to negotiate with. You’ll have the pictures.”

He shot a dry smile at her and saw her eyes widen suddenly in surprise…or fear? “What is it?”

She licked her lips. “You have a dimple.”

“Yeah.” No, it wasn’t fear that was in her eyes. “Now that we’ve settled that, give me the film. We both know that all I have to do is walk over to the bench, dump your purse and take the camera. You won’t be able to stop me.”

The pulse fluttered at her throat again, and it took all of his concentration to keep himself from reaching for her. To his surprise, he found himself saying, “I’ll give you my word that I’ll talk to Mr. Slade and put in a good word for you. Under one condition.”

When she licked her lips, Hunter dropped his hand, fisted it at his side, and reminded himself that he was dealing with a reporter.

“What’s the condition?” she asked.

“Who told you that Jared Slade would be checking in to Les Printemps this morning? And don’t give me any crap about protecting your sources. I want a name.”

There was a trace of a frown in her eyes when they met his. “I don’t have a name. My boss received a tip and she sent me to take it because she had an interview she had to do in Manhattan today. I told her I could get it. That’s all I know.”

“Your job was just to snap a picture?”

“Yes.”