LITMIR.BIZ

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husky voice soft and seductive, warmly intimate. “It’s proof I was actually there.”

      He was still holding the flower out to her, but Veronica couldn’t move, her mind barely registering the words he spoke. A black band was across his forehead, holding his long hair in place. He was wearing black pants and a long-sleeved black turtleneck, with some kind of equipment vest over it, even though the spring night was quite warm. Oddly enough, his feet were bare. He wasn’t smiling, and his face looked harsh and unforgiving. And dangerous. Very, very dangerous.

      Veronica gazed at him, her heart in her throat. As he stepped closer and pressed the flower into her hand, she was pulled into the depths of his eyes. The fire she saw there became molten. His mouth was hard and hungry as his gaze raked her body.

      And then his meaning cut through.

      He’d climbed down to the ground…? And back up again? Ten stories?

      “You climbed up the outside of the hotel and no one stopped you?” Veronica looked down at the flower, hoping he wouldn’t notice the trembling in her voice.

      He crossed to the sliding door and pulled the curtain shut. Was that for safety’s sake, or for privacy? Veronica wondered as she turned away. She was afraid he might see his unconcealed desire echoed in her own eyes.

      Desire? What was wrong with her? It was true, Joe Catalanotto was outrageously good-looking. But despite his obvious physical attributes, he was rude, tactless and disrespectful, rough in his manners and appearance. In fact, he was about as far from being a prince as any man she’d ever known. They’d barely even exchanged a civil conversation. All they did was fight. So why on earth could she think of nothing but the touch of his hands on her skin, his lips on hers, his body…?

      “No one saw me climbing down or up,” Joe said, his voice surrounding her like soft, rich velvet. “There are no guards posted on this side of the building. The FInCOM agents don’t see the balcony for what it is—a back door. An accessible and obvious back door.”

      “It’s so far from the ground,” she countered in disbelief.

      “It was an easy climb. Under an hour.”

      Under an hour. This is what he’d been doing with his time, Veronica realized suddenly. He should have been working with her, learning how to act like Tedric, and instead he was climbing up and down the outside of the hotel like some misguided superhero. Anger flooded through her.

      Joe took a step forward, closing the small gap between them. The urge to touch her hair, to skim the softness of her cheek with his knuckle, was overpowering.

      This was not the scenario he’d imagined when he’d climbed up the side of the hotel and onto her balcony. He’d expected to find Veronica hard at work, scribbling furiously away on the legal pad she always carried, or typing frantically into her laptop computer. He’d expected her to be wearing something that hid her curves and disguised her femininity. He’d expected her hair to be pinned up off her neck. He’d expected her to look up at him, gasping in startled surprise, as he walked into the room.

      And, yeah, he’d expected her to be impressed when he told her he’d scaled the side of the hotel in order to prove that FInCOM’s security stank.

      Instead, finally over her initial shock at seeing him there, Veronica folded her arms across her delicious-looking breasts and glared at him. “I can’t believe this,” she said. “I’m supposed to be teaching you how to fool the bloody world into thinking you’re Prince Tedric and you’re off playing commando games and climbing ten stories up the outside of this hotel?”

      “I’m not a commando, I’m a SEAL,” Joe said, feeling his own temper rise. “There’s a difference. And I’m not playing games. FInCOM’s security stinks.”

      “The President of the United States hasn’t had any qualms about FInCOM’s ability to protect him,” Veronica said tersely.

      “The President of the United States is followed around by fifteen Finks, ready to jump into the line of fire and take a bullet for him if necessary,” Joe countered. He broke away, pulling off the headband and running his fingers through his sweat-dampened hair. “Look, Ronnie, I didn’t come here to fight with you.”

      “Is that supposed to be an apology?”

      It wasn’t, and she knew it as well as he did. “No.”

      Veronica laughed in disbelief at his blunt candor. “No,” she repeated. “Of course not. Silly me. Whatever could I have been thinking?”

      “I can’t apologize,” Joe said tightly. “Because I haven’t done anything wrong.”

      “You’ve wasted time,” Veronica told him. “My time. Maybe you don’t understand, but we now have less than twenty-four hours to make this charade work.”

      “I’m well aware of the time we have left,” Joe said. “I’ve looked at those videotapes Mac Forrest sent over. This is not going to be hard. In fact, it’s going to be a piece of cake. I can pose as the prince, no problem. You’ve gotta relax and trust me.” He turned and picked up the telephone from one of the end tables Veronica had pushed aside to clear the living-room floor of furniture. “I need you to make a phone call for me, okay?”

      Veronica took the receiver from his hand and hung the phone back up. “No,” she said, icily. “I need you to stop being so bloody patronizing, to stop patting my hand and telling me to relax. I need you to take me seriously for one damned minute.”

      Joe laughed. He couldn’t help himself. She was standing there, looking like some kind of hot, steamed-up-windows dream, yet sounding, even in anger, as if she was trying to freeze him to death.

      “Ah, you find this funny, do you?” Her eyes were blue ice. “I assure you, Lieutenant, you can’t do this without me, and I am very close to walking out the bloody door.”

      She was madder than hell, and Joe knew the one thing he shouldn’t do was keep laughing. But damned if he couldn’t stop. “Ronnie,” he said, pretending he was coughing instead of laughing. Still, he couldn’t hide his smile. “Ronnie, Ronnie, I do take you seriously, honey. Honest.”

      Her hands were on her hips now, her mouth slightly open in disbelief. “You are such a…a jerk!” she said. “Tell me, is your real intention to…to…foul this up so royally that you won’t have to place yourself in danger by posing as the prince?”

      Joe’s smile was wiped instantly off his face, and Veronica knew with deadly certainty that she’d gone too far.

      He took a step toward her, and she took a step back, away from him. He was very tall, very broad and very angry.

      “I volunteered for this job, babe,” he told her, biting off each word. “I’m not here for my health, or for a paycheck, or for fame and fortune or for whatever the hell you’re here for. And I’m sure as hell not here to be some kind of lousy martyr. If I end up taking a bullet for Prince Tedric, it’s going to be despite the fact that I’ve done everything humanly possible to prevent it. Not because some pencil-pushing agency like FInCOM let the ball drop on standard security procedures years ago.”

      Veronica was silent. What could she possibly say? He was right. If security wasn’t tight enough, he could very well be killed. She couldn’t fault him for wanting to be sure of his own safety. And she didn’t want to feel this odd jolt of fear and worry she felt, thinking about all of the opportunities the terrorists would have to train their gunsights on Joe’s head. He was brave to have volunteered for this mission—particularly since she knew he had no love for Tedric Cortere. She shouldn’t have implied otherwise.

      “I’m sorry,” Veronica murmured. She looked down at the carpet, unable to meet his eyes.

      “And as for taking you seriously…” Joe reached out and with one finger underneath her chin, he lifted her head so

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