LITMIR.BIZ

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at him. “How can you possibly think I’d want to break bread with you after—after—” Frustrated, she couldn’t even find the words to finish her sentence.

      “Because you need to keep up your strength,” he repeated, “and you’re going to have to eat sometime. Might as well be something good and on the house. C’mon.” He nodded toward his right. “The restaurant is this way.” Then, in case she was going to take offense at his leading again, he added, “I know you don’t exactly know your way around The Janus.”

      There was no denying that. Still, she thought of turning on her heel and just walking away. Of letting Matt lead the way only to turn around at the restaurant to find that she had gone.

      But in the end, she followed him.

      This was business, strictly business, she told herself, and to act on her impulse would have been petulant. She did need Matt as long as her investigation took her into the heart of Montgomery’s casino, and she had a feeling that somehow, some way, Candace’s death was tied to her coming here last night.

      The restaurant was only doing a moderate amount of business. It was the lull between lunch and dinner, and the pace was less hectic. The waitress came to take their order barely minutes after the hostess had shown them to a table.

      Matt ordered the meal he’d mentioned earlier, then looked at Natalie who was perusing the oversized, velvet-covered menu. He didn’t want to rush her. “Need more time?”

      “No, let’s get this over with.” It was a cruel thing to say, but she felt herself sinking fast. Agreeing to eat with him had been a mistake. She could feel it in her bones. Natalie surrendered her menu to the waitress. “I’ll have what he’s having,” she told the young woman.

      “This isn’t penance, you know,” he told her, focusing on her first statement.

      She looked at him pointedly. “Isn’t it?” And then she raised her hand, as if to erase her words from an invisible chalkboard. “Sorry. I should be more professional than that. I usually am more professional than that. It’s just that I never expected to see you again,” she confessed. “And it’s kind of thrown me.”

      That smile she’d always loved curved one half of his mouth. Unsettling her stomach. “Welcome to my world.”

      She shook her head. Ignoring him and the effect he had on her was getting to be impossible. But she was determined to go down fighting. “I’ll pass, thanks,” she said.

      Several minutes passed. Despite the low level din around them, silence sat like an awkward, uninvited guest at their table, making them both feel uncomfortable.

      It had never been like this, Matt thought. Not even from the very start. He took a stab at stereotypical conversation. “So what have you been doing with yourself, besides becoming a police detective?”

      “That’s about it,” she said, her tone sealing the doorway that led into her life. “You? Where did life take you after you made your escape?”

      “I didn’t escape, Natalie,” he pointed out patiently. “I did it for your own good.”

      Second verse, same as the first, she thought. “You broke my heart for my own good,” she mocked. “How do you figure that?”

      There was no point in rehashing this. He couldn’t go into specifics. “I don’t want to get into it now.”

      “Of course not. Because you’re making it up as you go along, and you’re at a loss where to go next with this. News flash, I’m not buying. Any of it.” Suddenly making up her mind, she stood up. “You know what? I’m not hungry.”

      He glanced to the side and saw the waitress approaching with their meals. “Why don’t you stay a while?” he coaxed. “The waitress is coming with the food.”

      “You eat it. Or don’t. Take it home in a doggie bag, or leave it here. I really don’t care,” she informed him. And with that, she stormed away.

      All she wanted was to get out of the restaurant and the casino. And most of all, she wanted to get away from him.

      Chapter 8

      Natalie got as far as the other side of the Rainbow Room’s entrance.

      That was where Matt, after tossing down several bills on their table to cover the meal they weren’t having, managed to catch up to her. Taking hold of her shoulders, he swung Natalie around to face him. Agitated, trying to deal with a host of jumbled emotions, he hadn’t the faintest idea what he was going to say to her.

      As it turned out, he didn’t say anything.

      Instead, he acted. Before he knew it, his instincts had taken over and completely overruled even a glimmer of common sense.

      Matt brought his mouth down on hers before he could think better of it or try to stop himself.

      He didn’t want to stop himself.

      Natalie struggled to pull back for less than half a heartbeat. That’s all the time it took for her longing and the hunger that was eating away at her to kick in. It surged through her veins like a runaway wildfire.

      A bittersweet feeling of homecoming washed over her. Her mind, all but spinning out of control, just utterly shut down.

      She was instantly propelled eight years into the past as a tidal wave of euphoria materialized out of nowhere, sweeping over her. Robbing her of her senses as she clung to him.

      God she’d missed him. Missed the feeling that only he could create inside her.

      Not that she let anyone else even try. She hadn’t taken any relationship on a test drive since theirs had ended. Hadn’t even allowed herself to become involved in one. It was far too much trouble. She’d become all work, no play. Relationships brought the specter of heartache with them, and her quota had been filled up for a lifetime.

      Besides, Candace went out with enough men for both of them. There was no need for her to participate in this madness. So, for the last eight years, she’d been a virtual nun.

      She wasn’t acting like a nun now.

      Deep down in her bones, Natalie knew she shouldn’t be doing this, knew that this momentary aberration had just made her life a hundred percent harder. The amount of backpedaling that was going to be required to balance this out was going to be enormous.

      But for this tiny island of time, it didn’t matter to her.

      All that mattered was riding this lightning bolt until it disintegrated beneath her feet.

      Her arms tightened around his neck as her body sealed itself to his.

      How had he managed to survive without this? Without her in his life? How had he managed to wake up each morning without finding her in his bed? Right at this moment, he hadn’t a clue.

      All his noble reasons for walking away from her turned to confetti and blew away in the wind like so many tiny squares of colored paper.

      The feel of her body against his lit a fire in his veins. If they weren’t out in the open like this, in a public place undoubtedly garnering attention, he would have swept Natalie up in his arms and taken her to his bed—or to any handy flat surface in a pinch. And succumbing to a moment of weakness, undo everything that had cost him so much to do in the first place. Leaving her hadn’t even been the hardest part. Staying away was.

      He still loved her.

      If he’d harbored any doubts about that, they were gone now. Moreover, he was still in love with her, which was a completely different thing, and even he could understand the basic distinction now.

      Lost in a fog, Matt was thinking more clearly than he had these last agonizing eight years. Passion filled him as he deepened the kiss.

      Struggling to find the strength that she’d always prided herself on possessing, Natalie finally managed to wedge her hands against his chest and

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