ELEVEN
It took intense concentration for Tyler to focus through a blinding rage so he could drive them back to the mansion.
Discovering she’d slipped out through a hidden door in a mural-covered wall at the back of the changing room meant he didn’t have to suffer the humiliation of knowing she’d tiptoed out behind his back. But the thought someone might have taken her made him experience his second wave of unwarranted panic in a handful of hours. The realization she’d stood
in front
of the hidden door while he checked the space both eased his mind and made him angry as hell.
The latter feeling grew when he had another moment of clarity. He’d been played since the moment they got there.
By the time he’d searched the store, tracked down Janice and interrogated her until she confessed Miranda had left in a cab there wasn’t a rock in the state of New York he wouldn’t have turned over to find her. The mayor’s head of security would rue the day he’d given him the scope to
‘do whatever he needed to do’
when he locked her in a cell and lost the key. His next move was an attempt to get the cab number off the store’s security cameras. When that had failed he’d gone hunting for her partner in crime.
Throughout it all he was battling emotions he’d been unable to control since he’d let them out of the damn box. By challenging him to make a move she’d got a glimpse of him few people on the right side of the law ever saw.
That Tyler came from the dark side. He was the man who had spent so long among the dregs of humanity no amount of scrubbing would ever make him clean. He was the lean and hungry one, the cold one, the one who would devour her until he’d taken all she had to give and left her feeling as empty as he did.
She didn’t want to mess with that Tyler.
The silence coming from the back seat was a wise move. She could forget a third strike; there wasn’t going to be one. What was more, it was time to play the card he’d been holding close to his chest. If she’d behaved he wouldn’t have to use it. Now he didn’t have a choice.
When they landed back at the mansion he followed her inside and headed straight for the control room. Yanking open one of the drawers on a filing cabinet, he searched for the file he needed and checked the contents. Then he headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time to speed up the process until he reached the hall and marched to her door.
The three sharp knocks he made on the wood were answered with an invitation to come in.
She frowned when he stepped over the threshold and closed the door behind him. ‘You can’t come in here.’
‘You told me to come in.’
‘I thought you were
Grace.
’
Holding up the file, he stepped across to the small seating area on one side of the room, pointedly ignoring the presence of her large bed. ‘Little light reading for you...’ Slapping it down on one of the small tables beside a deeply cushioned armchair, he folded his arms and widened his stance to claim the ground he was standing on. ‘I’ll wait for questions.’
‘You can’t
be
here,’ she argued as she moved away from the windows. ‘What if someone finds you?’
‘So long as you don’t start another fashion parade we should be fine.’
She scowled at him as she stepped over to pick up the file. ‘What is this?’
While she opened the cover and bowed her head to look at the contents he studied her reaction through hooded eyes. Her gaze lifted and sought his before she sat down on the chair farthest away from him. Laying the file on her lap, she turned to the next page.
When she spoke her voice was lower and surprisingly calm. ‘How many of these are there?’
‘They’re the ones we take a closer look at.’
‘Because you consider them a potential threat?’
‘It’s the tone as much as the content. After they’re fingerprinted and tested for DNA, a psychologist looks them over and builds a profile.’ He shrugged. ‘Vast majority of them are sent by fruitcakes still living in the basement of their parents’ house when they’re forty.’
She flicked a brief glance his way. ‘Is that true or are you just saying it to make me feel better?’
‘I’d be willing to bet your picture is pinned to more than one of those walls in this city.’
‘Eww.’
She grimaced.
He didn’t mention there’d be less of them if people got to know her the way he had in the last forty-eight hours. When he questioned why he hadn’t mentioned it, Tyler realized his rage had dissipated. Claiming back a little control probably had something to do with it. Added to the fact they were discussing something that felt closer to police work than babysitting, it was understandable he felt more at ease.
When he noticed the almost imperceptible tremor in her hand as she turned another page Tyler assumed she’d got to one of the more twisted letters.
‘Why have I never been shown this file before?’
‘They probably thought it was better you didn’t know.’
‘You obviously disagree.’
As her gaze flickered towards him again the hint of vulnerability he could see in her eyes made him question if he’d done the right thing. He took a short breath. ‘Figured if you knew what was out there it might help you understand why things have to change around here.’
‘So why not show it to me on the first day?’
Determined he could control her without it would have been the honest answer. But since showing it to her would then be somewhat akin to admitting defeat...
‘Wasn’t time,’ he lied.
She turned her head a little, her gaze searching the air while she gathered her thoughts. As something occurred to her there was a blink of long lashes and she looked him in the eyes again. ‘You think the person you saw in the crowd this morning might have sent one of these letters?’
Tyler nodded. ‘It’s possible. I’ll know if I see him again. I’m good with faces.’
She frowned for a moment before confessing, ‘I can’t believe there are people out there who would write these letters to me. Let alone
mail them.
’
‘I told you, famous brings out the crazy.’
‘I don’t know how I’m supposed to react to this.’
‘Calm is good. A lot of folks would be nailing boards over the windows and bulk buying pepper spray by now.’
The comment earned a brief if somewhat half-hearted attempt at a smile before she closed the file and stood up. One of her hands rubbed her hip while she stretched out the other. ‘Can you take this with you?’ She avoided his gaze. ‘I don’t want it in here.’
For the first time since he’d entered the room Tyler took a look at his surroundings and realized his mistake. He’d done more than introduce her to the darkness in the world beyond the walls of her cushioned existence—he’d brought some of the sickness he dealt with every day into her haven. But it didn’t stop there—one mistake leading directly to another—not only shouldn’t he have come to her bedroom, he shouldn’t have taken a look around.
It revealed more about her than he’d wanted to know.
Large, bright flowers covered the wallpaper, crystal chandeliers and mirrored glass sparkling in the autumn sunshine pouring through the windows. The furnishings were soft and textured, reminding him what she’d said to a little girl about liking the way things felt.
The penny dropped. She was
tactile.
It was why she touched so many arms and ruffled heads of tousled hair. She’d demonstrated the same thing when she traced the pearls around her neck. It was part of her inherent sensuality; as witnessed when he’d watched her cup her breasts and smooth her palms over the curves of her body. With the revelation came a question: How did she deal with being surrounded by people who weren’t allowed to make physical contact? The need to touch and be touched had to make her as much of a ticking time bomb as him.
It explained a lot when it came to
that kiss.
The file nodded in front of him, her brows lifting.
Unfolding his arms, he stepped forwards and took it from her. As he walked back to the door she followed him.
‘Tyler?’
He turned to look at her. ‘Yeah?’
‘Thank you. You’re the first person who thought I could handle this and I appreciate that.’
In fairness he hadn’t stopped to consider that any more than he’d thought about the repercussions of charging into her bedroom like the proverbial bull in a china shop. But the knowledge softened his stance a little. ‘Does it make more sense as to why I’ve been so rough on you?’
The question garnered a better attempt at a smile. ‘It’s not just because you’re mean and moody?’
‘And mysterious, let’s not forget that one.’
The knowing gleam in her eyes placed him about two seconds away from offering to touch and be touched, any time she felt the need. If he didn’t think she would come out the other side of it a lot worse off than him, he wouldn’t have any qualms about being used that way. He doubted any guy who’d watched her dance would. Though he’d never felt the urge to step on a dance floor, he knew what it meant when a woman moved the way she did.
The sexy rotation of her hips, the back-and-forth movement of her pelvis, the fluid curve of her spine, mile after mile of flawlessly tanned skin with spectacular breasts and long tresses of flame-red hair tumbling over her shoulders and down her back.
Suddenly Tyler could see such a vivid image of her naked he could practically feel her weight on top of him as she hovered on the edge of release.
Time to go.
‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
She nodded in reply.
Despite frowning on the way back to the control room he decided—as risky as it was—he would have to pay more attention. He’d missed a lot of clues that had been right in front of his face and that wasn’t like him. Prejudice could cloud the evidence, he
knew that.
But now he knew he didn’t have all the answers—he had to take a closer look.
If they could find a way to get along better after the tentative truce they’d struck in her bedroom, maybe things would get better and he could focus on something other than sex with a woman who was out of bounds.
Doubtful,
but worth a try.
TWELVE
Miranda was determined not to let it get to her.
By thinking about the contents of the letters she was allowing whoever had written them to occupy a place inside her head. She refused to give them that but to deny she was rattled would have been pointless. In the following busy days the only time she felt secure was with Tyler around, which was a tad ironic considering the danger
he
posed.
She glanced at him as he completed a check of the room and stopped to run his gaze over the buffet table. ‘I’d eat something if I were you. There’s not a lot of time for snacks during the speeches stage of the campaign. I think I saw mini-doughnuts somewhere. They’re a cop thing, right?’
‘Not if the cop wants to stay in shape.’
‘You have trouble with your weight?’
‘Not everyone is blessed with my godlike physique.’
Miranda stifled a smile as she looked away. It hadn’t escaped her attention he’d been working on his sense of humour lately, even if it demonstrated a distinct lack of anything missing in the ego department.
Lifting her bag from the floor beside her chair, she rooted around for the objects she’d brought with her to help pass the time. Her mother liked to sit out front in the audience and listen to the never-ending soliloquies—her daughter, not so much. Since her father was speaking to a pro-Kravitz crowd she didn’t see the need to be there until they had to provide a united family front for the press.
With the sheet of paper carefully smoothed out on the table, she reached for the small box sitting beside it as Tyler pulled out a chair and joined her.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I promised I’d finish it.’
‘She won’t know if you don’t.’
‘That’s not the point.’ Miranda shrugged a shoulder as she selected a slim crayon. ‘It’s a karma thing.’
‘Careful with those lines.’
‘Studying me for a test, Detective, or is everything I say and do so memorable you can’t get it out of your mind?’
‘Been working long on that confidence problem?’
She lifted her chin and raised a brow. ‘You’re asking me that after the godlike physique comment?’
‘That’s just stating a fact. You can’t argue them.’ He selected what looked like a small samosa from the teetering pile on his plate. ‘Whereas what you just did? More like wishful thinking.’
When he popped the morsel in his mouth and smirked, Miranda rolled her eyes and continued colouring.
‘It’s easy to be confident when everything you want gets handed to you,’ he said a couple of minutes later.
‘I take it we’re talking about me again.’ She swapped one crayon for another. ‘Were you this judgmental with the last person you bodyguarded?’
‘I don’t think bodyguarded is a word.’
‘Is now...’
When she glanced upwards he had his gaze on the open door as an announcement sounded from the auditorium and there was a wave of applause. As he lifted long arms out to his sides in a leisurely stretch the edges of his navy jacket parted, feeding her hungry gaze with the sight of a pale blue shirt stretched taut over his sculpted chest.
Godlike might have been an exaggeration but there was no arguing the man was ripped.
She wondered when he found time to work out and then pictured him hot and sweaty, pumping weights...
‘This is my first gig as a bodyguard,’ he confessed as he lowered his arms.
Miranda averted her gaze. ‘Well, that explains a lot. What did you do before you got here?’
‘Police work.’
‘What do you call this?’
‘Babysitting.’
‘I walked right into that one, didn’t I?’
‘Yup.’
When she glanced upwards again and saw him press his lips together her eyes narrowed. ‘Was that a smile?’
‘Those little triangle things are spicy.’ He tapped a closed fist against his chest. ‘Probably indigestion.’
Miranda felt her mouth curve into a smile of her own.
Shifting his weight on the chair, he reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and produced a cell phone, frowning down at the screen as it flashed.
‘Are you going to answer that?’ she asked.
‘It’ll wait.’
‘Player.’
He looked into her eyes. ‘What makes you so sure it’s a woman?’
‘Isn’t it?’ She blinked innocently. ‘For all I know it could be your wife.’
‘How long you been waiting to ask that question?’ When she didn’t reply he rested his left elbow on the table and showed her the back of his hand. ‘Do you see a ring?’
‘That doesn’t mean anything.’
He lowered the hand to lift something else off his plate. ‘Does to me.’
Miranda liked that it did. Without saying so in as many words he’d conveyed he was the faithful type. She didn’t have any proof of that without taking his word for it but she knew instinctively it was true. After all, she’d met more than her fair share of liars over the years.
People who attempted to befriend her because of what rather than who she was—who thought they could get her to speak on their behalf to her father or that dating her would deliver their five minutes of fame. She’d met them all and knew she had trust issues as a result.
She would never have the same problems with Tyler. He didn’t have an agenda other than doing his job.
Knowing that should have made her feel better but, oddly enough, it didn’t.
When she returned her attention to what she was doing, he took a short breath. ‘Since we’re playing the sharing game, how come it took you so long to have that talk with your mother?’
‘Congratulations,’ Miranda said dryly. ‘It took you a whole four days to bring up the subject. I didn’t think you’d last that long.’
‘Deflection—I invented that.’
She sighed heavily. ‘Mothers and daughters often have complicated relationships.’
‘My sister gets on fine with our mom now she’s got better about calling her.’
The comment lifted her gaze. ‘You have a sister?’
‘And three brothers.’
‘There are three more of you out there?’ The thought was a tad too much for her brain to contemplate.
A corner of his mouth lifted and for the first time—while looking directly at him as it happened—she realized the move lowered the other side. It was almost a yin and yang thing, hinting at two sides of his personality.
‘There’s only one of me,’ he said as if denying the thought she hadn’t voiced. ‘The rest of them get to spend their time trying to reach the high bar I set for them.’
‘You’re the eldest?’
‘I’m in the middle.’
‘I might need you to explain to me how the high bar works if there were two born before you.’
‘I raised it,’ he replied without skipping a beat.
Miranda nodded. ‘You tell them that, don’t you?’
‘Repeatedly.’
She tried to imagine what it must have been like to be part of such a large family. Apart from the freedom they had growing up, she envied the company they would have provided for one another. It made her realize how much she missed having Richie around. He’d be joining the campaign soon and they would have to find the time to talk. She just hoped he could forgive her for breaking their pact.
Pushing the thought from her mind, she jumped into the opening Tyler had given her to get to know him better. ‘What do your siblings do?’
‘My sister runs the legal department at her husband’s company. The rest of us are cops.’
Her gaze lifted again. ‘
All
of your brothers are with the NYPD?’
‘Third generation,’ he said with an obvious note of pride. ‘It’s in the blood.’
‘You never wanted to be anything else?’
‘Nope.’
It explained where some of his confidence came from. He’d known exactly what he wanted, worked towards it and achieved his goal, whereas Miranda’s confidence was born of a need to survive. It wasn’t that she didn’t have it
now,
but in her teens it was a different story.
‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ he asked.
Ouch.
But considering she probably deserved it after the way she’d been with him, Miranda let it slide. Instead she set down the crayon and pushed her chair back. ‘Do you want something to wash down that mountain of food?’
‘Avoidance—I invented that one, too.’
‘I’m
thirsty
and a bottle of water might help with your indigestion.’ She felt his gaze on her as she approached the buffet table.
‘You sure you can manage to find it on your own? Don’t you usually have someone to do that for you?’
‘There are several things I’m perfectly capable of doing on my own.’
‘You’re just not given much of a chance to do them...’
‘No,’ she admitted before lifting a bottle of water from a bowl of ice and turning to look at him. ‘You want one of these or not?’
He nodded. ‘Go on.’
There was another announcement as she returned to the table, followed by loud cheering as she stopped by his chair and reached out her arm. Long, warm fingers wrapped around hers as she handed the bottle to him, providing a sharp contrast to its icily dewed surface. Miranda drew in a sharp breath in reaction to the heat travelling up her arm and tingling across her chest to her sensitive breasts. Moving downwards, it pooled low in her abdomen, creating an empty throbbing between her thighs.
When her gaze lifted the intensity in his eyes devoured her, leaving her in no doubt he knew the effect his touch had on her body. What she couldn’t understand was why he hadn’t done something about it. He didn’t strike her as a man who would let something as trivial as boundaries stand in his way.
Part of her was disappointed, another frustrated. But he had no way of knowing she was different with him than she’d ever been with anyone else.
As far as he knew she played the tease with every guy she met, safe in the knowledge if they attempted to cross the line she could simply step behind a protective wall of security personnel and add another tick to a battle of the sexes scorecard. He didn’t know how tough it was to date in high school with a bodyguard present. He couldn’t imagine how long it had taken for her to lose her innocence to someone who wouldn’t consider the virginity of the mayor’s daughter a significant notch on their belt. He would
never
know how disappointing the experience had been or that even with determination the three other times she’d managed to find enough privacy to have sex with the same guy hadn’t been a whole heap better.
In the end it had led to a bitter break-up, which left scars she covered with a veneer of self-assuredness it had taken years to perfect. Appearances could be deceptive.
A police detective should know that.
Slipping her hand free, she turned away and stepped over to her chair, curling her fingers into her palm as if she felt the need to save some of the warmth of his touch for later. While her father began his speech they both twisted the lids off their bottles and took a drink.
‘You haven’t answered the question,’ he said.
Miranda resisted the urge to look at him. ‘Because I know what you’re doing. You think by sharing things about your life with me, I’ll confide in you.’
‘Afraid I’ll sell the inside story to the press?’
‘No,’ she answered honestly. ‘Just suspicious about your motives.’
‘Cops ask questions. It’s what we do,’ he reasoned before adding, ‘isn’t sharing stuff and getting them to empathize how you usually persuade your bodyguards to cut you some slack?’
‘I think we’ve already established I have to work harder than that with you.’
‘Which is part of the attraction, isn’t it?’
Miranda’s gaze snapped up. They were actually going there? Before she made a fool of herself again she had to be sure. ‘Attraction?’
The cobalt gaze locked to hers remained steady. ‘I think you know what I’m talking about.’
‘Maybe you should elaborate.’
‘How explicit do you want me to be?’
Miranda ran the tip of her tongue over her lips and watched as his gaze lowered for long enough to follow the movement. ‘You think I can’t handle explicit?’
If he knew the number of times she’d imagined him telling her exactly what he was going to do to her...
‘I think you still don’t know you’re swimming out of your depth.’ His tone was suddenly hollow and cold.
Subliminally Miranda responded to the accompanying emptiness she thought she could see behind his eyes with the need to offer comfort and return some of the heat he’d created inside her.
She wanted to be alone with him,
really
alone
.
She wanted him to want the same thing; to ask questions because he wanted to get to know her better and not because he was gathering information to make his job easier.
‘Miranda—five minutes.’
The sound of another voice drew her gaze to the open door. ‘Thanks, Roger.’
As he disappeared she gathered her things together and placed them back in her bag without looking at Tyler. Reaching inside, she produced the prerequisite Vote Kravitz badge and pinned it to the front of her blouse. ‘You want one of these? I always carry a few spares.’
‘I didn’t vote for him last time.’
Miranda smiled. ‘You probably don’t want to mention that in front of him. Unless you
want
to hear the one-on-one version of the campaign speech?’
‘Any other tips you want to pass on?’
‘If he says he’ll take it under advisement it means he’s going to ignore what you said.’
‘Good to know.’
While he cleared the table and walked to the trash can beside the buffet table she checked her appearance in the mirror of a compact and fluffed her hair into place. They met at the door, Tyler waiting silently by her side as she paused to take a breath and fortify herself for the trials ahead. It was time to put on her game face but before she did she allowed him a rare glimpse of a well-kept secret.
As the chill ran down her spine instead of hiding it she shook it off with a shudder of her shoulders. Once she realized what she’d done she glanced sideways and attempted to cover up her vulnerability with a wink.
‘Showtime.’
The low huff of amusement seemed to catch him as off guard as it did her, the immediate following need to shift his gaze to the people assembled behind the stage making Miranda’s chest expand with what felt a little too close to endearment. She knew he didn’t smile much but suddenly she ached with the need to experience it, to see how it changed his face and hear the sound of rumbling male laughter.