The city’s glittering lights surrounded the car, but Cara stared at the back of the seat in front of her. Through the open window she caught a whiff of a salty scent that could only have been the ocean she had heard so much about. It was a lovely scent, unique, and served to scramble her sense of duty.
Suddenly, behaving herself and allowing these guards to take her someplace she didn’t really want to go just didn’t suit her at all.
So when the car slowed for the next red traffic light, Cara opened the door.
Standing on the sidewalk, Rafe stared at the darkest stretch of beach with his senses wide-open. The wind had changed, taking the mysterious scent with it. He listened to the waves and muted music from one of the hotels. There were no police sirens tonight, and for the moment, no noisy tourists. It was just him and the beach.
Nevertheless, his pulse continued to race as if he was about to discover something. He hoped whatever that was justified his reluctantly giving Brandi the heave-ho. She hadn’t gone without a pouty fuss.
Rafe buttoned his shirt and tucked it into his jeans. He scanned the beach, looking pretty much like anyone else who might be out for a nighttime stroll, except for the badge pinned to his belt. He hadn’t taken the time to put on his shoes.
A half-moon overhead made the wave foam look silver and the sand appear as soft as velvet. Yet all was not so calm beneath the surface. The farther he had walked from those glittering hotel lights, the more his senses nagged about something being different tonight, something he had to pay attention to. If the strange scent had reached him on his balcony, its source couldn’t be far off.
When his cell phone buzzed with a text message, Rafe cursed the interruption. Still, the number that came up on his screen was an important one. This would have taken precedence over a call from his department anytime. It was his father asking him to come home. Judge Landau seldom made such a request.
“Okay,” Rafe muttered without immediately texting back. His attention was fixed on the water, where a solitary figure had emerged from the waves.
A woman.
She stood near the sand with the water swirling at her feet. He was pretty sure she was naked. Although the idea that occurred to him was insane, Rafe ran a hand over his eyes, imagining that he could be looking at a mermaid.
Of course, there was nothing strange about someone taking a nighttime swim, so he should just turn around and head home. But the feeling of stumbling onto the mystery that had called him here had gotten stronger, along with that unidentified scent.
Using the special abilities that allowed all Weres to see in the dark with more precision than their human counterparts, Rafe stared hard at the woman near the shore, even though his mind issued a warning about infringing upon her privacy.
The moonlight shone on the water behind her, presenting him with her slim silhouette. Her legs were slender. Long wet hair cascaded over bare shoulders.
Though Rafe couldn’t see the woman’s face in the dark, even with his considerable Were talents, he knew she was looking straight at him with the same kind of scrutiny. The intensity of her attention was electric.
“You all right?” he called out. “Are you alone? The tides can be quite treacherous for anyone swimming solo.”
The mermaid offered no response.
“Well, I’ll leave you to it, then,” Rafe said. “Sorry if I interrupted whatever you were doing.”
Maybe she thought he was some kind of pervert for staring at her. Could he blame her? On the other hand, if she did turn out to be a mermaid...
He shook his head sharply, clearing away that ridiculous notion. Again, though, he got the funny feeling this woman was connected to what brought him out here tonight in the first place. Since there was no one else around, he had to consider that she could very well be ground zero for the sensations running through him.
He didn’t see a towel or a pile of clothes that might belong to her on the sand. She made no move to turn away or cover her bareness with her arms. Being naked all alone was one thing. Being naked on a public beach was another.
“Do you need something to wear? Maybe someone took your clothes while you enjoyed your swim?” he asked.
The woman didn’t speak. Her earthy, not quite identifiable exotic scent floated around her like a cloud.
“You can have this.” Rafe removed his shirt and held it out to her, then shook it as an enticement for her to take his offering.
“Fine.” He lowered his arm when she made no move toward him. “But you really can’t walk around like that. Not here.”
“Why?”
Her question rendered him speechless for a few beats. She had a deep, throaty voice unlike any he had heard lately. Sort of a whisper. Almost a purr. It moved the wolf buried deep inside him with the kind of physical response usually reserved for a full moon.
Rafe shook that off, too. “You might scare the tourists,” he managed to say. “Or receive a proposition or two that you find offensive.”
When the woman shook her head, her waist-length wet hair swirled. Though he wanted to see more of her, Rafe figured she already thought he was a perv.
“There are no strings attached. The shirt is a gift.”
“I don’t know you,” she said.
The sexiness of her tone produced a strange fluttering sensation in his chest, which Rafe also found absurd given the circumstances. Hell, he wasn’t going to arrest her for indecent exposure, because he was the only one out here at the moment, and honestly, what he could see of her was quite decent. What he had to do was to go away and leave her alone.
And yet her rapt attention kicked his pulse upward another notch, and the air between them seemed to be charged with ions like those preceding an oncoming storm system.
There was danger here, his instincts warned. He had to tread lightly if he hoped to understand what that danger was.
“I’m with the police,” he said to explain his continued presence.
“And you’re a werewolf,” she returned with way too much insight and confidence.
Rafe was stunned. “Werewolf, is it?”
She spoke again. “I’ve heard that Weres around here have to try to fit in. You look human.”
“Why would you think I’m anything other than human?” he asked.
“Practice.”
After waiting a few more heartbeats, Rafe said warily, “If I’m a werewolf, what does that make you for recognizing me as such?”
“I guess I’m harder to define.”
“Maybe you can try.”
“I’ve
