Hot Contact (3 page)

A
rianna saw him retreat, not only physically by taking a step back, but his expression cooled, too.

“Some cases don't get solved. It's a sad fact of life,” he said, crossing his arms. “So are you the reason I got an invitation to the party last night?”

She owed him the truth. “I saw a picture of you and Scott in his den last month when I had dinner there, and I asked about your relationship. Then I started having nightmares about my father.” She brushed some crumbs off the counter with her hand, hoping he wouldn't see how much the dreams affected her. “For the first time since I was a little girl I got out the scrapbook I'd made after he died. I hadn't remembered the lead detective's name, Mike Vicente. It seemed too much of a coincidence, but I did some checking and found out he was your father.”

“Then you asked Scott to invite me to the party so you could set me up.”

She shook her head. “I wanted to talk to you. Away from your office.”

“What made you think I wouldn't have talked to you? Met with you, away from the office? Did you figure you had to play the sex card to get my attention? I assure you, I'm not that base.”

“The attraction was real and unplanned,” she admitted. “Unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately?”

“It complicated everything.”

“You seemed to deal with that complication just fine. Nice dance, Arianna. Great kiss. I bought it.”

His anger was justified, but it still stung. “I didn't know it was you by the waterfall. I had no idea.” She couldn't tell if he believed her. His expression didn't change. “As for the kiss, I was as swept away as you were. The last thing I needed was—was…” She spread her hands wide, not able to come up with the right word.

“Chemistry?”

“Yes. I don't know if you've heard but I haven't exactly endeared myself to the LAPD through the years.” Which was putting it mildly, she thought.

“I heard rumors,” he said, then shrugged. “I asked around a little after we met.”

“I have a lot of resentment.”

“I gather that. At least now I know why.”

She'd wondered. She'd thought maybe that was why he hadn't tried to contact her after they met last year. But that was before she knew he'd been engaged. “I figured you might have. But there's no denying we made some kind of connection when we met. I also figured if you got to know and like me, you would be more willing to do me a favor.”

He shoved his hands in his back pockets. “What kind of favor?”

“I want to see my father's file. I had hoped you'd find a way to get it to me.”

“All you have to do is request it.”

“No. It's unsolved. I've been denied access.”

“That makes no sense. If the case is twenty-five years old, what would it matter? Certainly you're entitled under the Freedom of Information Act.”

“My relationship with the LAPD is bad enough already. Pushing legalities would only hurt me in the future when I need information for a case. All I want is to see the file. And find the killer,” she added, the most important issue.

“Why do you think you could?”

“It's a hunch. I'm a good investigator, and I'm not bound by a cop's rules.”

She could see him thinking it through.

“Was your father involved in a crime?” he asked.

“My father was a thirteen-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department. He died in the line of duty.” A situation that still made her both angry and proud. He'd been her knight in shining armor—but he'd been taken from her.

Joe hardly missed a beat. He rested his palms on the counter and leaned toward her, his gaze locked with hers. “Then you know that my father and everyone else at the department did everything they could to find the killer and bring him to justice. Everything.”

She didn't break eye contact. “And yet they didn't solve it. Tell me, Joe. If it was your father who had been murdered and justice hadn't been served, wouldn't you be doing everything in your power to find the killer?”

He was quiet long enough that she began to hope.

“I can't help you,” he said at last, pushing away from the counter.

Hope died. “Why not?”

“A hot file like that—a cop whose line-of-duty death was never solved? That would require approval from some brass before I could pull it from Records. Plus, it would look like I was working, which I can't be, because I'm on vacation.”

“When you get back from vacation, then.”

“I'm off for four weeks starting today. If you can wait that long I'll give it a try.”

She decided to press. “Would you let me talk to your father?”

“That's not possible.” He picked up two of the food containers and carried them to the kitchen table.

“Why not?”

“I've given you my answer, Arianna. If things were different I would try to help you.”

Her throat burned. He was her only chance of getting a look at the file, short of hiring a lawyer and making an issue out of it, which would totally destroy whatever small amount of credibility she had with the department. Not to mention that she needed the nightmares to end.

She looked blankly at all the food she'd brought. She couldn't stay there any longer.

Arianna extended her hand. “I'm sorry I bothered you.”

He took her hand then didn't let go until she met his gaze. Sympathy brought out specks of gold in his green eyes, but he didn't try to stop her. She was grateful for that.

She kept her emotions in check as she pulled away from the curb. Now what? Where could she go? Not back to her mother's house. Not to her own apartment, either. Too quiet. To the office, then, where she spent most of her life, anyway.

She had to come up with plan B.

 

An hour later Joe tossed his inventory log onto the dining room table and headed to the backyard, in need of fresh
air. He stalked the grounds, hunting for nonexistent weeds, then sat next to an orange tree and rested his back against the trunk. He plucked a blade of grass, then another. One more.

He didn't know why he'd expected anything different. Of course Arianna wasn't interested. He was a cop, LAPD at that—just like her father, a man who had died in the line of duty. And his own father hadn't found the killer.

That was just the beginning. Her income was probably three times his—or more. She had fit in at Scott's party, as sophisticated as the rest of his guests. Joe hadn't, which is why he'd discovered the waterfall in the first place. He had decided he'd made a mistake by going to the party and so had looked for a place to hang out until he could politely leave.

Then Arianna had appeared in the misty, mysterious place like a wish fulfilled, her spicy perfume alerting him to her presence, her sexy body jolting him back to life after a long sleep, her dark eyes entreating him to trust and hope. Was it all a game? She said it wasn't, that the attraction was real and unplanned and complicated. He would've believed her, believed she was honest, if she hadn't misled him last night. What was the truth?

He'd been lied to before, most recently by his own fiancée. He hadn't learned to play those games and didn't know how to spot the players.

Arianna hadn't shown herself to be any different. She'd walked out as soon as she learned he couldn't be of any use to her.

So much for trying to get back his life. And a date. It was too bad his interest had been piqued to the degree it had.

“Joe?”

He swung around. Arianna stepped through the side gate and into the yard.

“I didn't mean to just barge in, but I rang the bell several times. Your car was still out front, so I took a chance you were out here.”

Damn, she was one sexy woman. Curvy, fluid, graceful and…competent.

“No problem,” he said, standing to greet her.
Stay this time….

“I apologize for walking out on you,” she said.

He liked her directness and that she looked him in the eye. He even liked that she didn't offer an excuse. She was in search of the truth. He couldn't fault her for using whatever method it took to find that truth.

“Forget it,” he said. “Are you hungry? I seem to have some extra food on hand.”

After a moment she smiled. “I'm starving.”

Keep it light, he told himself. “That's the real reason you came back.”

“Absolutely. The only reason.”

As they moved toward the house, he resisted resting his hand on her lower back as he had the night before, but her perfume whispered to him, urging him closer. He'd already danced with her. Kissed her. Held her against his body. He wanted to sweep her into his arms right now, but she wasn't a woman who could be rushed. He already knew that about her.

He also knew if he played his cards right, she might stay for dinner.

 

Arianna appreciated attractive men as much as the next woman—she just didn't trust them. There were exceptions. Her partners in her firm, Nate Caldwell and Sam Remington, were both attractive and trustworthy. And she sensed
that Joe Vicente was a man she could trust. Maybe too much.

She let her gaze wander over him as he stored the leftovers in the otherwise empty refrigerator. He had the body type people called rangy—lean and loose-limbed. He moved slowly and spoke thoughtfully. A deliberate man, she decided. Someone who didn't make mistakes often, either in words or action. Important qualities in a detective. She wondered if his father was the same way.

She also wondered why Joe was protecting him.

Arianna hadn't realized her gaze was lingering on Joe's rear end until he turned around and caught her staring. In truth, although it was a very nice feature of his anatomy, she'd been lost in her own thoughts, not drooling. He couldn't have known that, however, and the last thing she wanted was to get involved, even just physically, with a man as wounded as he seemed to be.

Surprisingly, he didn't tease her. Instead he sat across from her at the kitchen table and said nothing, apparently letting her decide what would happen next.

She should probably go. She was keeping him from his task.

“Is this hard for you?” she asked instead. “Emptying your parents' house?”

“I grew up here. It's home.”

“Do you
have
to sell it?”

“Yeah. Why'd you come back, Arianna?”

She'd been waiting for that question. He was a detective. He would want motive. “I don't know,” she said honestly. “I started to drive to my office, but I got stuck in traffic, and I realized I didn't want to go there. I thought about how abrupt and rude I'd been, leaving like I did.”

“You were disappointed.”

“Greatly. But that's my problem, not yours. My mother
didn't want me to pursue it. Maybe I shouldn't.” Making and keeping eye contact was ingrained in her. He matched her skill. She wasn't sure what he saw when he looked at her, but she couldn't shake how worn-out he looked. Protective instincts she'd never acknowledged before slammed into her, throwing her off balance. “Look, do you need help?”

His brows went up. “Help? With what?”

“With doing your inventory. Are you getting things ready for a garage sale?”

“I'm taking what I want to keep and deciding what to donate and what to toss.”

She couldn't figure him out. Last night he'd taken charge, his good-night kiss even more memorable because of his complete command of the moment. Today he seemed to be holding back, waiting for her to make a move.

Fine. Good. She didn't want him to pursue her, anyway, right? She didn't need that kind of complication. She'd been careful not to become involved with a cop, not even once. She could resist him.

“Are you offering to help?” Joe asked.

“I'd be happy to.” The words spilled out unchecked. To cover her astonishment, she pushed away from the table and glanced at her watch. “I have to be home by six o'clock.”

“Four hours is more than enough time,” he said, also standing.

“I have a date,” she added, almost wincing at the defensive tone in her voice.

“I see.”

She heard the smile in his voice. She hadn't been this rattled since…she couldn't remember when. A woman in her profession couldn't afford to be.

But then, this wasn't business.

 

In the attic, Joe watched Arianna wrap a framed photograph in newspaper and pack it carefully in a box, as if it were her treasure, not his. What he'd heard about her when he'd inquired around the department last year was that she was tough, smart and unsentimental, facts he'd observed for himself when she'd provided him with information on the Wells case last year. Their involvement had been brief and businesslike, with a hint of male/female awareness making the meeting interesting. But he'd also been engaged to Jane. In all the complications of his life since then he'd forgotten about Arianna.

He wondered now how he could have. Anyone who thought her unsentimental hadn't seen her expression when she ordered him to go do something else so she could pack his mother's clothes. She'd even shut the closet door before he returned so he wouldn't see the empty space. He would remember her kindness.

Joe glanced at his watch. She would have to leave soon. For her date. He didn't know why he'd assumed she wasn't involved with anyone. Maybe because last night she'd come to the party alone, and danced with him, and kissed him back.

But last night she'd come to the party for a purpose—to meet him. She wouldn't have brought a boyfriend along. It would've been business to her.

She was a damned challenging woman. And he liked predictable.

“What's in those boxes?” she asked, pointing to the last ones, tucked under the eaves.

He closed the lid on the trunk he'd been rummaging through, deciding he needed to keep everything in it. Relics of past generations.