“Well, let’s just say the small talk’s a surprise. I don’t imagine you suffer fools gladly-” She stopped, not knowing what to call him.

He looked at her. “Huck.”

“That is your real name, yes? And these stories about your family-”

“All real. Think I’d make up learning how to waltz?”

She hesitated. “I’m not sure I know what you’d do.”

“Probably just as well. My parents are open-minded by conviction and nature. Not a mean bone in their bodies. I, on the other hand-” He lifted Quinn’s shawl back onto her shoulders. “Mean as hell.”

“I don’t know about that.” She sat up straight, feeling a little light-headed now, and more than a little self-conscious. “I haven’t had dinner, and I don’t have anything here except tea. Lots of tea. I was thinking about crab cakes at the local marina. There’s not much time before they close. Would you care to join me?”

“Only if you put on shoes.”

“And take off the dress-I mean-” Oh, hell. “I’ll change into jeans.”

But as she jumped up, she got tangled up in her shawl and ended up whipping fringe into his face. When she tried to yank it back and apologize, she tripped on his feet, and fell onto his lap.

“I told you,” she said. “I’m not that coordinated.”

“An expert in international crime, and here you are in a moth-eaten shawl and bare feet, sprawled on the lap of a bodyguard-”

“An armed bodyguard.”

He smiled, settling his arms around her. “I don’t think you’re as risk-avoidant as you like to pretend.”

His mouth lowered to hers, but it was her idea to put her arms around his neck, their kiss, she thought, not so much sudden as inevitable. From the moment she’d seen him on her porch tonight, Quinn had known, on some level, that this would happen. She relished the feel of his mouth on hers, the taste of him as she let her palms travel up his arms, feeling the hard muscles under his denim jacket.

As she fell back against the couch, her shawl dropped to the floor and her dress rode up to her thighs. With a little jolt of panic, she remembered that she had absolutely nothing on under her dress.

Her mouth opened to the kiss, his hands coursing up her legs, then along the bare skin of her hips. She thought she heard his breath catch. He lowered one hand, parting her legs ever so slightly, teasing her with his fingers. She responded to his touch with a small gasp of her own, and a flood of wet heat.

“I want to make love to you,” he whispered. “Now, tonight.”

She brought one hand back down his arm, and, ignoring his holster and gun, down to his hip, her fingers drifting across his pants to his zipper. In a few swift moves, she could have him exposed. They could make love on the couch, in the bay breeze, keeping each other warm.

You are out of your mind…

The thought did nothing to stop her. With a feathery touch, she outlined the length and breadth of his erection, even as he slipped two fingers into her, his mouth finding hers again as he thrust tongue and fingers in the same erotic rhythm. Now she could barely breathe at all.

She placed her palm against him, pushing firmly, imagining his hardness inside her as they indulged the sexual tension that had sparked between them. She imagined herself naked under him. Finding his belt, she undid the buckle, fumbling, then lowered his zipper. Her dress was up to her waist now. He withdrew his fingers, cupping her with his palm.

“Quinn…” His voice was ragged, his eyes dark on her.

With a boldness that surprised her, she wrapped her hand around him, his erection thick and hot, so close to her she had only to guide him a few inches.

“We’re not-” She couldn’t believe what she was saying. “Huck, this is just nerves.”

He pulled back so fast she almost landed on the floor. “Damn. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?”

He gave her a ragged smile. “Well, not that sorry.”

He swept her shawl up and gently tossed it over her, and when she got up, this time she didn’t trip. She fled back to the bedroom and stripped off her dress, threw it and her shawl onto the bed, and pulled on underwear, jeans, a cotton sweater, thick socks and running shoes. The marina was casual. She took a moment to dab on lipstick, using her bureau mirror, noticing that her cheeks were flushed. What has gotten into you? She had no idea, but doubted Huck had come there to dance with her, or make love to her, or do anything except his job.

Which job?

Who was he tonight, Huck Boone of Breakwater Security-or Huck McCabe of the U.S. Marshals Service?

Quinn pushed back her doubts but didn’t chastise herself for them. Staying on guard made sense. Asking questions. Being analytical, objective. She could even rationalize dinner with a man she was almost certain hadn’t told her even half the truth about himself and his reasons for being in Yorkville.

But she liked the idea of not having dinner alone.

30

Huck didn’t know what was going on with him, but it sure as hell wasn’t nerves. As he and Quinn walked along the dock of Yorkville’s small marina, tucked in an inlet just off the loop road, he imagined a different kind of night, one where Quinn wasn’t tortured by a friend’s death and he wasn’t working, torn by his responsibilities and sense of duty-and the sense of danger he felt. Hanging out with paranoid vigilantes and private security types was bad enough, but his uneasiness had more to do with what the network he was supposed to penetrate had planned. These weren’t people who liked to stay idle for long.

Walking with Quinn Harlowe on a beautiful spring night only heightened his awareness of the stakes.

“That’s Gerard Lattimore’s boat,” she said, pointing to a yacht at a slip about thirty yards down along the main dock. “Yorkville’s a bit quiet for his tastes. When he was married, his wife almost never came down here with him. She doesn’t like boats. I think he comes more because of his friendship with Oliver Crawford.”

“Not because of you?”

“No.” She didn’t elaborate. “It doesn’t look as if he’s here yet. Maybe he’ll come in the morning. He was on his way to a meeting when he called to invite me to the open house. I left town early-I have more flexibility than he does now that I’m out on my own.”

“Lattimore wants you back at Justice,” Huck said.

She shrugged. “I suppose that’s better than breathing a sigh of relief that I quit.”

“Why did you quit?”

“Flexibility, opportunity, the chance to be my own boss.” She smiled. “I had illusions of having a life.”

They stopped at a spot along the dock where there were no boats, the water black under the night sky, reflecting here and there the gleam of lights from boats and the rustic restaurant. A variety of pleasure boats and fishing boats bobbed in the low tide.

A quiet night in Yorkville, Huck thought.

Quinn stood next to him. Her hair seemed blacker, her skin paler, almost translucent, but her eyes had taken on some of the darkness around her. “Lattimore doesn’t know anything about you, does he?” she asked.

“The fewer people who know about me, the better I like it.”

“I’m not going to give you away. I can be discreet.”

Huck let her comment go. After dancing and nearly making love in her cottage, he figured neither of them could claim discretion.

“I was still at Justice when Oliver Crawford was kidnapped,” she went on quietly.

“Lattimore must have gone apeshit.”

“It was a tense time. I left not long after Crawford was rescued. The FBI was investigating-I assume they still are.” She looked back out at the water. “They must have briefed you.”

“Quinn-”

“I’m not asking. I’m just saying.” She paused, squinting down the dock, toward the marina, then touched Huck’s wrist. “That’s Lattimore there.”

Huck, who’d only seen pictures of the deputy assistant AG, saw a good-looking, gray-haired man in a dark suit get out of a Breakwater SUV and shut the door, waving to the driver. The SUV backed out. Vern? Lubec? One of the Riccardis? Perhaps Oliver Crawford himself, Huck thought, watching Lattimore, caught in a dim streetlight, spot Quinn and smile, then join them out on the dock.