purred as she wiped her chin. She sighed and plunked her bottle back onto the counter. She resisted the urge to wince. Although her lipstick did a great job of camouflaging her split lip, the alcohol still burned on contact.
She leaned against the bar and adjusted her position slightly so she could look her target directly in the eye...well, she could if he turned his head a mere five degrees and allowed her to. Jerk. Maybe he just wasn’t in the mood?
Only one way to find out.
She pulled a cigarette out of her purse, a girl never knew when she’d need a conversation starter, and provocatively leaned in his direction. “Do you have a light?” she asked, peering up at him as if the world just might come to an end if he gave the wrong answer.
He looked at her, that piercing gaze cold enough to give her frostbite, then glared at her breasts for a fraction of a second. “No,” he growled before looking away, clearly unimpressed.
Dammit.
Well, at least he’d spoken to her.
She tossed the cigarette onto the bar and propped fully against the counter, pressing her shoulder into his, as she drank her beer and contemplated her next move.
The beer was cold and refreshing once it got past her lip, but he was making her sweat. Usually she didn’t have this much trouble getting a guy’s attention. Surely three months sitting behind a desk at Langley in a two-piece suit hadn’t thrown her off the game this badly. Giving herself grace, she hadn’t actually ever attempted to bait a killer. It must be tricky, she mused. Rising to the challenge, she studied him out of the corner of her eye. His profile was strong, his jaw chiseled. A scar running from the corner of his mouth to the middle of his cheek served as a kind of permanent dimple. Otherwise, movie-star-quality features, but more rugged. She squinted for a better view. There was something in his hairline.
Another scar...
No.
Tattoo.
A number: 6...6...shit...
She stiffened.
He turned his head and pointed those laser-blue eyes directly at hers.
She opened her mouth but it took about three seconds for the words to come out. “Is that...?”
She couldn’t say the rest. He knew what she meant. She saw it in his eyes. Damn. Was this guy for real? Focus, Tasha. Stay calm. She forced her heart rate to slow before that cowboy Maverick could come bursting through the door.
He was still staring at her.
“What do you want from me?”
An involuntary shiver raced over her skin at the sound of his voice. Or maybe she was just freaked out by the bizarre tattoo. But the deep, gravelly sound scraped over her flesh, leaving every single nerve ending raw and tingling.
“I...” She moistened her lips and grappled for the cocky attitude she’d waltzed in here with. “My name’s Tasha. I just thought you were cute and that maybe we could—”
He looked her up and down. Not a fast and furious sweep, but a slow, methodical perusal...as if he were devouring every square inch of her with his eyes. She shivered again. Jesus, what was wrong with her?
When that unyielding blue gaze collided with hers once more, he said, “Go away.”
Had this encounter tanked or what?
She mustered up a properly pissed-off look and the body language to go with it. “Maybe I don’t want to. Maybe I like it right here.” She guzzled the rest of her beer. “You know,” she said, her gaze focused on the mirror behind the bar, but her voice just loud enough for him to hear, “I knew moving here would be a mistake. My first night on the town and I get the brush-off from the best-looking guy in the club.” She turned toward him then, pressed even more intimately against him. “Why is that, do you think?”
He shifted just enough so that his face was about two inches from hers. “Maybe it has something to do with that big mouth.”
She laughed softly and then sighed, allowing her breath to feather across his lips. “Well, now I know, don’t I?”
He turned away as if he hadn’t even noticed her seduction attempts. How the hell was she supposed to crack this guy?
Lucas’s offer echoed in her ears...succeed in this mission and you’ll come to work for me with the best of the best. Failure was not an option. The cell phone tucked into her boot vibrated. Maverick, no doubt.
She braced a hand against J.D. as she fished out her phone. He flinched. Great, he didn’t even want her to touch him. “Yeah.” She turned away from the exasperating man, straining to hear over the music.
“I take it we have contact.”
Maverick’s call would show up as a cell phone listed to her fake roommate, Patti. Under normal circumstances he would call if he didn’t like what he saw on the monitor, if in distress she would say the right phrase or her inability to answer would equate to the same, and the cowboy would create a diversion, allowing her to escape whatever trouble she was in. But tonight’s call was just to ensure contact had been made and to tie her to his monitoring link. Once he’d put a call through to her cell phone, as long as that phone was turned on he could trace her. Backup to the other apparatus, he’d told her. He liked playing it safe. She glanced at the brooding man at her side. “Definitely. I thought you were coming back to pick me up, Patti.”
“Our friend is nearby,” he said knowingly. “Very good.”
“Yeah. Forget it, I’ll figure out something.” She hung up, closed her phone and tucked it back into her boot. She heaved a disgusted sigh. She couldn’t be certain how this would go from here, but at least she’d made contact. That’s all Lucas had wanted for tonight. But she wanted more. She wanted to prove how fast she could work...how deep she could go right from the start.
Her target suddenly stood.
Damn.
He tossed a couple of bills onto the counter, clearly preparing to split.
“You leaving already?” She shifted as close to him as possible. “We didn’t even get to dance.”
She looked up at him with all the sensual invitation she could muster. For two beats he stared right back at her without a word...without a reaction at all.
Abruptly he snagged her by the arm and moved away from the bar. Startled on one level but grateful on another, she allowed herself to be dragged around the fringes of the dance floor, zigzagging to avoid gyrating bodies. His fingers were like iron vises around her wrist. He didn’t slow down until they had cleared an emergency exit and were standing in the alley behind the club. Fear trickled through her but she quelled it instantly. Somewhere in the back of her mind she wondered vaguely why no alarm went off when they pushed through the exit. The fire marshal needed to start doing his job. She suddenly hoped like hell Maverick was doing his.
“Decide you want to take me home with you?” she encouraged, blocking the internal alarm going off inside her head. She was playing with fire here. Pushing the limit...but at least she had his attention now. When she would have reached toward him he shoved her to
