No Strings Attached

She took the solid wooden stairs up to the second floor two at a time and burst through the unlocked exterior door, but then stopped dead and stared down the narrow hallway that ran along the building’s back wall as the door bounced off the inside wall. Down near the far wall, Luc stood in front of the studio apartment that her longtime renter, Will, had recently vacated, the aforementioned duffel bag at his feet. At the sound of her less-than-subtle entrance, he spun away from fitting a key in the door lock, his right hand reaching toward the small of his back before suddenly freezing.

That got her moving again. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she demanded as she strode up to him. She thrust out a hand. “Give me that key!”

“Taking your questions in order,” he said dryly, “I’m moving in, cariño. And no.”

She stepped up until they stood nearly nose to nose. “What do you mean, no?”

“It’s a fairly self-explanatory word, princesa mia. I’m not giving back the key. I signed a contract that says I’m the proud owner of this studio apartment for the next ninety days.” He flashed that charming white smile of his that creased his cheeks into not-quite-dimples. Seven years ago its power had rendered her stupid.

She was neither charmed nor made stupid by it this time around, however—not by the smile or his damn Spanish endearments. Back in another lifetime she’d made him explain what those sweet nothings meant, but she’d long since put them out of her mind. And she assured herself firmly that hearing them now left her cold.

Luc himself, unfortunately, did not. From the moment they’d met on that long-ago dawn-cooled beach, she’d felt the heat of the sexuality he exerted with such apparent ease. And much as she might wish otherwise, she still did. He was just so damn...male. And so flipping effortlessly carnal and attractive in his plain navy T-shirt and worn Levis that she spared a second to regret the sullied white apron she had tied around her hips and her old, faded, shapeless T-shirt that stuck messily to her skin in the all places where she’d splashed herself. Which, face it, in her zeal to clean the kitchen, were many. And once again she didn’t have on a speck of makeup. She had to quit letting him catch her looking so undone all the time.

Seriously? Are you listening to yourself? She stepped back and stood tall. Luc Bradshaw was nothing to her. It didn’t matter what he thought of her appearance.

Then, belatedly realizing what he’d just implied, she addressed the real issue here. “You’re Will’s college roommate?” That couldn’t be right; he had to be a good five years older than her former tenant.

“Okay. Sure.”

Oh! He didn’t even try to make her believe it. “You so are not. How did you get him to tell me that you were?”

He rolled his muscular shoulders in an unrepentant shrug. “I may have flashed my badge and told him it was a matter of national security.”

She gaped at him in disgust. “God. You just lie as naturally as the rest of us breathe, don’t you?”

It wasn’t a question, but he took a large step forward that somehow had her backing against the end wall. Propping his arm above her head, he leaned close and looked down at her, making her aware of the heat that pumped off his body, even though they weren’t actually touching.

“The idea, before I thought better of it, was to check out my half brothers without them knowing who I am. And I had no idea you owned the joint—I just liked that it wasn’t a hotel room and it was in Razor Bay. But as for lying,” he said in a low, rough voice, “I’ve got a job that takes me to places where I sure as hell better be good at it. Being fond of staying alive and all.”

She made a rude noise. “Of course—oh, silly me to have forgotten for a moment that you’re a low-life drug dealer.”

He blew out a breath that wafted across her face, and damn his hide, it smelled minty fresh, when by rights it ought to carry the stench of brimstone and lies. “I’m not a drug dealer, Tash,” he said in the mellifluous voice she remembered, the one that was almost as deep as his half brother Max’s. “I’m undercover DEA.”

Cold fury pumped through her veins, and, slapping her hands to his chest, she shoved him back. “You do not get to call me Tash as if you and I are friends,” she said through gritted teeth. “And do me a favor and skip the I’m-really-just-a-poor-misunderstood-good-guy routine, because I’m not buying it.” She thrust out a hand. “Let’s see that contract,” she said, conveniently ignoring the fact that she had a copy filed in her own place.

He turned back to the door and manipulated the key still stuck in the dead bolt. The lock clicked softly, and Luc opened the door and waved her in.

“I’m not going in there with you,” she said—and watched something in his face change that gave her another quick glimpse of the dangerous, determined man she had seen before in a faraway thatched-roof hut nestled on a white-sand beach.

“You are if you want to see the contract,” he said flatly, his right biceps flexing even rounder and harder than it already was as he lifted his bag and hauled it inside. “Everything I own is in my duffel—I’m damned if I’ll empty it out in the hallway.”

“Fine,” she said ungraciously, and, folding her arms over her breasts, she followed him into the studio.

Both apartments above Bella T’s opened onto a narrow veranda that ran the width of the building and looked down on Harbor Street. They boasted sweeping views of the bay and Hood Canal, plus the Olympic Mountains that made it not a canal at all but rather a spectacular fjord. Luc struck Tasha more like a leather than a wicker kind of guy, and he looked big, dark and out of place, too tough to take up residence among the cheerful white furniture and the beachy blues, greens and beiges she’d used to decorate the compact studio.

He dropped his duffel on the end of the bed in the alcove and reached for its zipper. A moment later he pulled out the contract and carried it to her. “Have a seat,” he invited, waving a lean long-fingered hand at the grouping of an overstuffed love seat and two wicker rockers.

She carried it instead over to the tiny drop-leaf table in front of the big window and took a seat on one of the two chairs tucked in on either end.

She cursed her stiff-necked pride and the impulse to follow him in here to try to make him as uncomfortable as she felt. It had been a mistake. The truth was she already knew that Washington State favored tenants in contract disputes, that basically if she as landlord tried to evict, even with a good, solid reason, the tenant could stay in her rental free of charge until the dispute was resolved—which would take a helluva lot longer than ninety days. And she didn’t have a good reason to evict Luc. She sure wished now that she hadn’t allowed Will to find his own replacement and then exacerbated the mistake by leaving him to fill in the contract. She really regretted barely even glancing at the thing before scrawling her signature across it. Her only excuse was that she’d been so relieved at the prospect of three months’ rent money coming in while she worked to find a more permanent tenant.

Bella T’s had just concluded its second summer in business, and for a new restaurant in an industry where the majority of new ventures closed before their second year, it was doing remarkably well. But the pizza parlor was in a resort town that garnered most its income in the summer months. She was fortunate that she got quite a bit of local business, which helped her to escape many of the seasonal issues. But there were still definite lull periods. So until she had a couple more successful years under her belt and was confident she’d nailed down the most efficient ways to stretch her income throughout the entire year, not just in the months that she made good money, she appreciated the added security of collecting rent.

A small brown leather folder landed on the table next to the contract, and she looked up at Luc. “What’s this?”

“My DEA badge.”

She made a rude noise and nudged over the top flap, exposing a mostly gold badge of a spread-winged eagle with Department of Justice written in gold on a black ribbon across its torso and Drug Enforcement Administration and Special Agent circling the U.S. in the body of the badge beneath the bird of prey. It looked very official, but she shrugged and pushed it back toward him with one finger. “Big deal. People fake these things all the time.”

The short gritty noise that came from deep in his throat sounded suspiciously like a dog’s growl. “Jesus, you’re a hard sell. It’s the real deal. Here.” He shoved a driver’s license–sized photo ID toward her. “Here’s my ID.”

She yawned. “Again. Could be forged. How would I know the difference?”

He thrust his fingers through his hair and stared at her. “Look, we need to have an honest heart-to-heart about that night. There are a number of discrepancies and I’d like to figure out what the hell happ—”

“I have nothing to say to a man who lied to me about who he was.” She scooted her chair back from the table and rose. “The contract is solid,” she said smoothly. “But I’d like you to reconsider and find yourself another place.”

“Not gonna happen.”

She blew out a quiet breath. It wasn’t as if she’d really believed it might. “Whatever. Just stay the hell out of my way.”

“Sure,” he said with the oughtta-be-patented smile that had likely left a trail of discarded undies in its wake.

And she knew that probably wasn’t going to happen, either. “I expect first and last months’ payment by 5:00 p.m. today,” she said and left through his veranda slider.

Seconds later she had stalked down the decking to her own slider and let herself into her apartment. She closed it firmly behind her. Then, as an afterthought, locked it tight.

She needed a few minutes to pull herself together before she went downstairs and finished polishing up Bella’s kitchen. But as she paced from room to room trying to burn off the head of steam she had going, she had a nasty feeling it was going to take her a lot longer than a few minutes to work this itchy nervous energy out of her system.

Because how on earth was she going to survive three months of having Luc Bradshaw living right next door?

“Shit,” she whispered, scraping her hair away from her face as she stopped in front of the window to stare blindly out at the water and mountains. “ShitshitshitshitSHIT!”

Then she blew out a breath and tried to think. Swearing and wearing a path in her painted wooden floors weren’t doing jack on the make-me-feel-better front. Only one thing could do that, and she headed for the kitchen counter, where she’d dropped her cell phone.

Screw the cleanup—she’d get it done before opening time tomorrow or, who knew, maybe even later today if she could get a handle on this awful restlessness. But that was something to worry about later.

Right now, she was in dire need of the moral support that only girlfriends could supply.

* * *

LUC HEARD MUTED sounds coming from the apartment next door. After about fifteen minutes, Tasha’s front door slammed, followed seconds later by the outer door closing and the faraway clatter of footsteps growing even fainter as they progressed down the exterior staircase. He ambled out onto the veranda, leaned casually on the railing—and watched as she appeared on Harbor Street below and strolled toward his end of the building. She glanced up, and his heart gave a hard thump as their gazes clashed.

Ah, man. Scrubbing his knuckles over the sudden tightness in his chest, he stared down at her. It hadn’t been enough that she’d stood in front of him in her work clothes, her gorgeous skin all flushed from her obvious exertions and her thin T-shirt clinging to her breasts and diaphragm in little peekaboo patches transparent enough for him to see that she wore a blue lace bra beneath it? The girl knocked his socks off without even trying.

She had sure as hell put some effort into her look for someone now. Her pale eyes were made up all smoky-sultry, and her mouth—God, that lush, siren mouth with its top-heavy upper lip—was painted a soft, sheer red. She had on a short flirty skirt and a next-best-thing-to-spray-paint little girlie tee that clung to her and had a neckline cut low enough for him to see the upper curves of her pale breasts.

Her eyes narrowed. Then she looked away as if he were invisible and sashayed down the block.