LITMIR.BIZ

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have to be your problem.”

      “It’s my story. And you’re still holding out on me.”

      “So what?”

      “So, it’s a challenge.” She flipped her dark hair over her shoulders and shot him a look that dried his mouth. “I’ve never been able to resist a challenge.”

      He sipped his beer, which bought him some time and lubricated his tongue enough so he could talk again. He didn’t need any more challenges. He had all he could handle sleeping tucked up in his old bedroom under the eaves of his parents’ house. A ten-year-old challenge with his eyes and her mother’s scowl.

      Teresa DeLucca was playing with fire. He had to find a way to prove to her that she could get burnt. “You’re wasting your time, Tess.”

      “No, I’m not. Your partner’s not like you. He answers my questions.”

      “Honey, at two o’clock in the morning, the bearded lady could walk into this bar and Nowicki would answer her questions. Most cops are easy when they’re coming off shift. Of course, it didn’t hurt any that you’re wearing those pants.”

      She stiffened defensively. “So, they worked. I got what I wanted.”

      “You were lucky. You could have gotten something you didn’t want.”

      “Like what?”

      Jarek drew a short, sharp breath. He could do this, he told himself. He would prove to both of them that he was scorch proof.

      “Like this,” he said, and leaned forward, and covered her mouth with his.

      He surprised her, and Tess prided herself that very few men could do that anymore.

      His mouth on hers was warm and sure. She recoiled slightly—from shock and the faint taste of beer—and then let herself be persuaded, let her mouth be taken, by his. He was disarmingly direct. Devastatingly thorough. Competent, she thought almost resentfully, before her brain shut down. He angled his head and used his tongue, and she shivered and melted and sagged on her bar stool, seduced by the nearness of his firm, warm chest and that hot, bold mouth moving on hers.

      Oh, boy.

      He raised his head. Maybe he had surprised himself, too, because his eyes, that she remembered as gray and cool as midwinter ice, were dark and hot.

      She blinked.

      He eased back. “Didn’t your mother ever warn you not to come on to strange men in bars?”

      Indignation warred with…oh God, was that disappointment?

      She cleared her throat. “Obviously you’ve never met my mother.” She picked up her drink, pleased when the ice cubes did not rattle. She was still shaking inside from his kiss. It was just her bad luck Chief Law-and-Order Denko could kiss as well as he did everything else. “Anyway, you kissed me.”

      He shrugged, not denying it. “That may have been a miscalculation.”

      “Gee, thanks,” she drawled. “Worried it will ruin your reputation?”

      His teeth glinted in a brief smile. “No. Kissing you will do wonders for my reputation.”

      She refused to be charmed. “Thank you. I think.”

      And then he spoiled it by adding, “Besides, now every guy in the place knows you’re off-limits.”

      Tess set down her drink and glared at him. “Is that why you did it? Because you thought you were making a point?”

      “I did make a point. It’s not safe for a woman looking the way you do to walk into a cop bar and imagine the only thing she’s going to leave with is information. But that’s not why I kissed you.”

      “Oh, yeah?” she asked, very nastily because her body was still humming and her feelings were all mixed up. “So, why?”

      “I must have wanted to.” His eyes were dark and direct. “I think I’ve wanted to kiss you ever since I met you.”

      Her heart thumped in excitement. She straightened defensively on her bar stool. “And being a police officer, you figure you can take what you want, no questions asked?”

      He frowned. “No. Don’t theorize ahead of your facts, Tess.”

      The fact was, she didn’t trust cops.

      The fact was, she was attracted to this one.

      And she didn’t like that one bit.

      She raised an eyebrow. “Are you trying to tell me you’re an honest cop?”

      “I’m not telling you anything,” Jarek said evenly.

      No, he wasn’t. The only thing he had admitted to was wanting to kiss her.

      She nodded toward a booth by the door, where his former partner had joined a table of other off-duty detectives. “They seem to think you walk on water.”

      He shrugged. “I did my job.”

      “More than that, I heard. Ice Man? Cool under pressure. You took a gun away from some psycho commuter on the train—”

      He looked uncomfortable. “That was years ago. When I was a patrolman. Detectives don’t get written up for stuff like that.”

      “But didn’t you face more dangerous situations as a detective?”

      He regarded her silently for a moment. “You’re the oldest in your family?”

      She was confused. He confused her. She wasn’t used to men remembering what she said. “Yes. How did you—”

      “As the oldest, there are things that are expected of you, right?”

      Tess squirmed on her wooden perch. She didn’t like thinking about her adolescence, the years she struggled to keep Mark fed and out of trouble, the mornings she woke for school already dog-tired and sick-to-her-stomach worried and overwhelmed. She certainly never talked about them. “What’s your point?”

      “My point is, you don’t make a big deal out of meeting your responsibilities. You just do your job.” He met her gaze directly. “Same thing if you’re a detective. I did my job.”

      Tess fought the seductive tug of understanding. He was a cop, she reminded herself. They had nothing in common. “Very macho,” she said dryly.

      His mouth curved. “Damn straight.”

      She caught herself smiling back and thought, Uh-oh. She didn’t need these little sparks of connection. She couldn’t afford this tingle of attraction. She didn’t like the way Jarek kept turning this interview around. She was the reporter, wasn’t she? Dispassionate. Objective. In control of the conversation and herself.

      Sure she was.

      “What made you decide you didn’t want to be a detective anymore?” she asked.

      “Circumstances.”

      “Would your decision have anything to do with your wife’s death a year ago?”

      He set down his beer. “Who told you that?”

      She’d caught him off balance, Tess thought, cheered. Good. It made up, a little, for his uncomfortable perception, his unexpected understanding, his devastating kiss.

      I think I’ve wanted to kiss you ever since I met you.

      She pushed the thought away. “Nowicki,” she said.

      “Nowicki has a big mouth. And you should check your facts.”

      “She didn’t die?”

      “She wasn’t my wife. Linda and I divorced eight years ago.”

      Well. Tess wasn’t sure if she was relieved the new police chief wasn’t still grieving or disappointed that

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