some kind of guardian angel. It was eerie, and she seemed to feel it, too, melting against him as though she craved his protection.
Then she raised eyes hot with desire, and he saw she wanted more from him than protection. Lust pumped through him in thick surges.
The night was incredible. Like a fever dream they both were having. He felt he’d known her body—and her—forever. Maybe it was because they’d shared the experience of being betrayed. Maybe it was just chemistry. Maybe it was alcohol. He wasn’t sure, but he had to know more.
In the pink light of dawn, sated and exhausted, he sent her home in a cab. She’d made him swear to phone her.
But when he did, she wouldn’t take his call.
1
One year later
“YOU LOOK LIKE a dork in that suit,” the kid said, squinting up at Nick, who held the door for him and his mother.
The kid was right. Nick felt like a circus gorilla in the too-small doorman’s uniform. The epaulets rode close to his neck, his arms hung below the gold-braided cuffs, and the hat sat like a kid-die sailor cap on his head.
“That’s not nice, Rickie,” the mother said, flushing. “How is Charlie?”
It was Charlie’s uniform Nick was wearing. “Better. He’s recovering fine.”
“That’s good. I was so sorry to hear about his appendix. Will he be back soon?”
“Three more days.” Not soon enough for Nick, who couldn’t wait to get out of this clown suit and back to his boat on the lake. Charlie, his friend and former squad mate, had asked him to fill in as security at the Palm View Apartments while he recovered from surgery, and Nick had been happy to help—Charlie had been his training officer when he’d entered the academy.
Besides, the job was simple—accept packages, valet-park cars, carry groceries, fetch the maintenance man when the elevator jammed, as it had earlier that morning, and generally keep an eye on things for the well-heeled seniors, impatient executives and handful of families who inhabited the building.
If it weren’t for the uniform Charlie had neglected to tell Nick he had to wear, it would be only mildly humiliating work for a guy who’d busted some dangerous drug dealers in his day.
Now this kid stared at him like an exhibit in a wax museum.
“Got any homework, son?” he asked, to give him something else to think about.
“Uh, well…” The kid glanced at his mother.
Gotcha.
The woman blinked at her son. “Actually, now that you mention it, you do have a report, don’t you, Rickie? On the Sudan? You had better get right on it. Before TV.”
“Aw, Mom,” Rickie groaned.
“Gotta do your schoolwork, son,” Nick said with a wink. “You don’t want to end up just a doorman like me, do you?”
Rickie rolled his eyes.
The woman turned to Nick and smiled. “Thanks, Mr.—?”
“Ryder. But call me Nick.”
“I’m Nadine Morris…Nick,” she said, letting her eyes drift over his body. She held on to his name, flirting with him. She was pretty, but she wore too much makeup. Why women had to slather on that goop was beyond him. No ring. Divorced, no doubt.
“I’m just filling in for Charlie. Doing what he’d do.”
“Well, you certainly fill out his uniform.”
“I do my best,” he said neutrally. Even if he was attracted to the woman, he couldn’t take her up on the offer in her eyes. She’d want more than a brief affair—she had a kid, after all—and he was leaving for the Coast as soon as he could.
She kept smiling at him until her son dragged her toward the elevator.
Nick stayed outside for a minute, delaying his encounter with the fumes from the ground-floor hair salon. Why the EPA didn’t set restrictions on hair spray like they did auto emissions, he’d never know.
He glanced up at the art deco facade of the Palm View Apartments—one of Phoenix’s few old-fashioned downtown apartment buildings. Most had been torn down and rebuilt as office buildings or gone condo. The sun seemed too hot for early March, and he felt sweat slide along his torso inside the wool jacket, making his bullet scars itch. He rolled his shoulder as best he could in the tight jacket. Almost a year and he still hadn’t gotten back full mobility.
Sunlight glinting off passing cars made Nick blink. The cloying sweetness of citrus in bloom came to him on the light breeze. Nice, but he preferred the subtle tang of desert plants. Even better, the crisp salt scent of the ocean. Soon.
Three more days and he’d be back on Lake Pleasant in his boat, his private heaven, listening to the slap of the water and the coo of mourning doves. Then, once he’d paid off his ex-wife’s IRS debt with some chef work and maybe some bigger-paying security jobs, he’d escape to the blue freedom of the Pacific.
He was about to head inside when a cab pulled into the curved driveway and jerked to a halt twenty feet from where he stood. The driver exited and came around to let out his passenger, but before he reached the door, it flew open as if spring-loaded and a woman practically leaped out.
She wore a tight black dress, a red hat with a brim as big as a platter, and jeweled sunglasses that practically covered her face. She rushed to the trunk, with remarkable speed considering the stiletto heels she wore. She pushed open the trunk, blocking Nick’s view of the action, but when the cabby got there, there was a brief tug-of-war, which the cabby seemed to win, because the woman stepped away from the trunk while he removed the rest of her bags.
Stubborn woman. Nick wanted to laugh. Then something familiar about the slow curves of her body stopped him dead. He looked more closely at her face. Heart-shaped mouth. Dark, wavy hair. And a body that could stop action anywhere there were men. Like the Backstreet. Nick watched her pay the cabby, strangely unable to breathe. It couldn’t be….
But it was. Unmistakably Miranda. His hands still held the memory of caressing that body, its give and resistance. He could still taste that sweet mouth, could still hear his name on her lips. That night she’d worn a dress the red of her bizarre hat.
She glanced up at him. His heart stopped. She wants me, he thought, then cleared his head. She wants the doorman, you dolt. He snorted, realizing he’d have to schlepp her bags like a pimple-faced bellhop. How the mighty are fallen. Suddenly he wished Charlie had gotten another pal to cover for him.
MIRANDA CHASE FROWNED as the cabdriver practically hip-checked her away from her bags. She had no choice but to let him take over. It was part of his job, but she hated people doing things for her she could do for herself. She’d add a huge tip to his fare for his trouble.
She watched as he unloaded the dry-ice totes that held the sample blossoms from the new breed of Taos chili—the secret ingredient she needed to perfect her rejuvenation cream—and a decoction of lily of the valley and lemongrass
