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intense that he actually stood up. Abruptly, she
blinked. She said a quick word to the bartender, then turned on her heel and
walked rapidly toward the restrooms. Jase instinctively took a step to go after
her.
    “Jase, stop!”
    The command registered but was slightly muffled. He shook his
head, trying to clear the lust-induced fog that weighed it down. “What?”
    DeMarco looked at him incredulously. “Man, you can deny it all
you want, but you practically staked your claim on her in front of
everyone.”
    Every muscle still vibrating and at the ready to run after her,
Jase forced himself to sit down. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
    “So was it just her ass you were admiring? ’Cause it looked to
me like you never took your eyes off her face.”
    “Shut up, DeMarco,” Jase growled while opening his eyes.
    He could only stand DeMarco’s cheery humming of “man-eater” for
a few minutes. “I gotta take a leak,” he muttered and stood. “Grow up while I’m
gone, would you?”
    * * *
    B RAD T URNER WATCHED as the sexy brunette handed the good-looking man her card,
then walked past the bar, smiling and hips swaying. Although the guy’s
dark-haired friend enjoyed the view, the woman’s target absently pocketed her
card without even looking at it. All his attention seemed to be on the plain
redhead with a stick up her butt.
    After several minutes, Brad watched the redhead walk toward the
bathrooms. Unlike the other woman, there was nothing flirtatious or teasing
about the way she walked. Despite her slight limp, which made Brad wonder what
had caused it, her pace was measured and confident, though she’d seemed shaken
by the way the guy at the other table had looked at her. Not surprising, that
same man stood and followed her to the restrooms.
    Probably to have sex, Brad thought jealously.
    He’d never had sex in a bar. Hell, Brad had never had sex at
all.
    * * *
    J ASE ZIPPED UP HIS PANTS and washed his hands, then
banged his way out of the men’s bathroom. The door didn’t swing wide and then
slowly forward as he expected, but instead went to about midpoint before
colliding with something with a muffled thud.
    “Damn it!”
    He couldn’t know for sure, but somehow he knew the person
behind that voice had red hair and blue eyes. Sure enough, Carrie Ward stepped
around the door.
    Her annoyed expression wiped clean the minute she saw him and
was replaced by a studied blankness that he saw for what it was—complete and
utter bullshit. She saw him, all right, and the knowledge made him feel randier
than a seaman on leave. To cover, he tried something he rarely did with
her—straightforward common courtesy.
    “Welcome back, darlin’,” he said. “I heard you’re working your
first serial case. Congrats. Let me know if I can help.”
    She narrowed her eyes, as if she wasn’t sure whether he was
messing with her. “Thanks, Tyler,” she said simply. Then, with a satisfied
smile, she asked, “How’s the ear?”
    He grunted. “How’s the leg?”
    “My leg is fine.” When she moved to step around him, he
automatically countered to block her. She frowned and said, “Is there something
you need?”
    His eyes shot to hers at the way she emphasized the word need, but her expression had gone blank again. Despite
the prior rigidity he’d sensed in her stance, she was now all loose-limbed
indifference. She was almost as good as he was at faking casualness. It made him
want to drive a response from her even more, and, this time, he didn’t even try
to censor himself.
    “You know what I need, Ward, and it’s exactly what you need,
too. If we weren’t both cowards, we’d stop dancing around each other and just
get to it.”
    Her eyes widened as her cheeks bypassed pink and went straight
to scarlet. But she raised her chin and kept her gaze on his. “And by ‘get to
it,’ you mean what? No, wait, let me guess. Me under you, right? Because it sure
as hell wouldn’t be me on top, would it?