Hannah Evans faced Jake Malloy and his mouth fell open slightly. He had been expecting shyness and freckles from the baby sister of his best friend. Instead he found a woman’s smile and skin as perfect as a sun-washed June morning. With her big green eyes, blond hair and shapely mouth, she was as classically beautiful as Lauren Bacall or Cybill Shepard.
His gaze involuntarily slid from her face, down the long column of her slender neck and to her breasts. The back of her black gown might have been the simple fare he expected from the former tomboy, but the front was not. Black lace cruised an enticing strip of white cleavage.
Something twisted in Jake’s gut. When in the hell had Luke Evans’s little sister grown up?
Jake’s birthday guests mingled around them. The swish and rustle of satins and silks punctuated everyone’s movements. Hannah smiled shakily. “I’m not much of a dancer…”
“Oh, that’s all right.” Jake took her hand, leading her onto the dance floor—which was really the living room of his huge home with all the furniture pushed back against the walls. The slide of her palm against his sent a frisson of awareness through him, and though this was his best friend’s little sister, Jake didn’t stop himself from enjoying it.
Besides, this was business. He hadn’t asked Hannah to dance out of romantic interest, but because she was talking to Jake’s former college roommate and current CIA contact, preventing him from leaving. While Jake and Hannah danced, Edgar Downing would slip out of the party unnoticed.
Just as they found a clear spot on the dance floor, the fast music stopped and the DJ shifted to a slow, romantic tune. Again, Jake ignored the twinge of conscience that this was Luke’s baby sister. He wasn’t interested in Hannah, only doing his job. He took her right hand in his and slid his left hand around her waist, pulling her close enough to make sure he kept her attention off Edgar and on him. The material of her silky slip dress felt soft and feminine against his fingers. He could smell her hair.
“So you’re a teacher?”
She peeked up at him. Her long, straight locks shifted, slipped off her shoulder and cascaded down her back. They grazed the top of his hand. “I was.”
He grimaced. “Sorry. I forgot Luke told me you got laid off. I didn’t mean to bring up something unpleasant.”
“Oh, that’s all right.”
Jake noticed that though she was talking and dancing, her eyes had begun to move again. He didn’t think she was looking for Edgar. He believed it was a coincidence that she’d engaged his CIA boss in conversation the very minute Edgar needed to leave for another appointment. He suspected Hannah’s lack of eye contact was the shyness he had been expecting to find when he’d first tapped her on the shoulder.
Not only had she always been a bit timid, but Jake was also nine years older than Hannah. Plus, he was quarterback of the football team that had won the state championship fifteen years ago. No team had ever come close to their record. Jake himself got a college scholarship out of it. When he graduated, he talked Troy Cramer, owner of one of the biggest software companies in the world, into forming an investment partnership. Troy put up the money and Jake investigated and chose the investments. Now Jake was also rich.
He was older, wiser, sophisticated, and in the small town of Wilburn, Pennsylvania, he was a legend. To a woman like Hannah, who hadn’t even left home for college, dancing with him could be as intimidating as being asked to dance by Brad Pitt. Especially when her own life was in such a downturn.
“There’s little point in trying to run from the truth,” Hannah continued. “I got laid off thanks to some cutbacks. And I’m not the only one to get the ax, so everyone in town knows.” She met his gaze. “Wil-burn is too small of a place to run from things like that.”
He wasn’t prepared for the impact of staring directly into her pretty green eyes and didn’t have time to brace for the bolt of lightning that sizzled through him. He hid his reaction with a grimace. “I’m still sorry for bringing it up.”
As if dismissing the topic, she returned her gaze to Jake’s party guests. Her eyes once again surveyed the crowd. “I suppose I should tell you happy birthday.”
“If you bought me a gift, that’s happy birthday enough.”
Just as Jake had hoped, his silly remark brought her attention back to him. “Very funny.”
He smiled, continuing the teasing because he hated that she seemed so dejected. “It wasn’t intended to be. I like presents.”
“Right. I get it now. That’s why you gave yourself a party.”
“It didn’t seem as if anyone else was going to give me one.”
She laughed. “Then everything Luke told me about your vanity must be true.”
“Absolutely,” Jake agreed, tightening his hold on her waist, thrilled he had made her laugh. He knew he couldn’t have her. He absolutely, definitely would not date the little sister of a man who knew the sordid details of Jake’s love life. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t enjoy dancing.
Though the song was slow, he spun them around as if they were waltzing. He felt alive and wonderful and though he knew dancing with Hannah was part of the reason, the other part had more to do with Edgar recruiting him to work full-time for the CIA.
After eight years of being an Agency courier, someone who traveled so much that he could do pickups and deliveries for them, Edgar had approached him about becoming an agent. Not being able to shoot a gun and knowing absolutely nothing about covert operations, Jake had questioned Edgar’s sanity in making the offer, but Edgar reminded him that he traveled so much that he knew certain cities like the back of his hand. He knew currency. He knew languages.
With that explanation, Jake had become unexpectedly interested. Not because he craved adventure—though he did—but because he was bored. So Edgar’s offer appealed to him, and he told Edgar that if the CIA agent could show him he could handle this job, he would take it.
To prove to Jake that he could do this, Edgar had arranged for a more risky courier assignment. On Wednesday, Jake was to deliver a passport that had been sewn into the cover of the Day-Timer that Edgar had brought tonight as a birthday present. Jake would then “forget” the Day-Timer in a Paris café and it would be picked up by a waiter, who would drop it in the trash to be taken to a Dumpster behind the restaurant. An agent would pick it up and deliver it to the wife of an Iranian diplomat who had refused to defect until he had proof his wife was safe.
Though he hadn’t yet fulfilled the assignment, Jake knew he could do it in his sleep and within a few weeks he would be on the CIA payroll. In spite of the fact that becoming an agent would probably mean he could have to quit working for Troy, Jake knew he had found the way to make his life interesting again. And that knowledge filled him with absolute joy.
“I don’t mind being happy and confident. I’m lucky,” he said, teasing Hannah again, making sure she enjoyed this dance as much as he did. “My life panned out beautifully. I have more money than I could ever spend. And I’m not too bad-looking if I do say so myself.”
“You don’t have to say so yourself,” Hannah said, though her eyes were focused anywhere but on him. “Just hang around the bar. Most of the women there are talking about how attractive you are in that tux.”
And
