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asked, his voice husky, and unless she had lost her sense of hearing, more than a little suggestive.
    “No,” she whispered. His hands were big and warm, triggering pulsations that had nothing to do with the phone. In the space of a heartbeat, the edginess between them had shifted, intensified, from a mental struggle to a physical one.
    “Nothing at all?”
    He tightened his hold, stroking his thumb in a light, lingering path on the back of her hand. Sensations sparked within her.
    “Of course I feel something,” she managed to say around her heart thundering in her throat. “I’m flesh and blood, aren’t I?”
    A throaty chuckle. “I like it when you’re honest. One moment, let me put the phone away.”
    She realized she was holding her hands in midair, suspended where he’d abandoned them, as though they had no purpose other than waiting for his touch. “Don’t leave me hanging.”
    He captured them again. With a squeeze, he drew her closer, then placed her palms flat against his chest. Through his shirt, she felt his heart pumping, its beat steady and strong. That’s how he is. Steady, strong, focused.
    Raising one hand, he kissed her index finger before drawing it into his mouth. She shuddered a release of breath as he suckled it. Maybe she should admit she wasn’t really a hooker.
    Slowly, his mouth released its hold on her finger and moved to her wrist, which he kissed and nuzzled.
    Or maybe not.
    “Do you like that?” he whispered.
    “Ye—” The rest of the word ended in a small, ragged moan as his talented mouth and tongue tickled, nibbled and kissed the inside of her arm.
    “What’s your real name?” His voice, rough and low, reverberated through her.
    “V-val.”
    These were just caresses, and some wicked attention from his mouth, yet her insides were rocking and rolling as though they were buck naked in bed. She stifled a building moan and told herself to chill, gain some ground. She was acting as if she hadn’t been touched by a man in years.
    Well, she hadn’t. Two years, if she didn’t count that backseat fumble in Houston. A realization that was as depressing as it was embarrassing.
    But when he lightly trailed the pad of his thumb across her bottom lip, then dragged it leisurely down her neck, his touch both deliciously coarse and gentle, the only thought she had was more, more…
    “Why the wig, Val?”
    “Hmm?”
    “The wig. It’s obvious you’re wearing one. Why?”
    She mentally fought her way through the haze of arousal. “Does it…look bad?”
    As soon as she asked, she regretted it. Made her sound pathetically insecure about her looks, which was so far from the truth. If anything, she had been pathetically insecure about how she’d prepared for her job tonight.
    “It looks—” he fingered a lock “—like strands of moonlight. Gives you an unearthly, dreamy quality.”
    For a man who bottled up his words, he sure knew how to pour them on sweet and thick at the right moment.
    “I always wear it with this outfit.” Also true.
    “Interesting outfit to wear to Dino’s. Who hired you, Val?”
    “Nobody.”
    “Was it Yuri? You can tell me.”
    “Nobody.”
    Interesting, too, how he’d deftly manipulated this encounter so he was now in control. He’d plied her with his mouth and touch, worked her with compliments until her reserve dissolved, and she was ready to divulge whatever he wanted to know.
    This man had taken over her honey trap!
    Oh, no. Two thousand dollars, and the small but significant fact that her self-esteem needed her to succeed at her first P.I. gig, were at stake.
    Time for the queen bee to regain her territory.
    She had a job to do. Maybe she’d flitted here and there, floundered a little in her flight, but she would land this job, and do it right. This was her career, her future. Val Louvinia LeRoy would prove she had what it took to be a professional private eye.
    “I wore an interesting outfit,” she said, sliding her arms around his