Worth the Trip (3 page)

“Years,” Trip supplied. “We were young and foolish.”

“I was never foolish,” Norah put in. “At least I never used to be.”

“You were the one who broke up with me, remember?”

“That wins the crazy contest in my book,” Myra said.

Norah folded her arms. “This would be the book you’re judging by its cover, right?”

“Touché,” Myra said, turning back to Trip with an expectant look on her face, waiting for the rest of the story.

Trip was only too happy to oblige. The deeper he pulled Norah into the pretense, the harder it would be for her to dig herself out. “I just got back to the States, and I couldn’t wait to see Norah again.” She frowned at him, so he tweaked her playfully on the nose.

Norah didn’t take it for the affectionate gesture he’d intended. “You were quite a surprise,” she said, smiling sweetly as she swatted him not so playfully.

Trip slung an arm around her waist and pulled her hard against him. He took an elbow in the ribs, but the sound of her breath whooshing out was worth it.

Myra opened her mouth, looking concerned about the physicality of their “relationship.”

Trip cut her off. “Norah and I need to talk. She’ll catch up with you later.”

“Well then,” Myra said as she handed Norah’s purse over, “I’ll leave you to your reunion. Try not to cause any permanent damage.”

Trip didn’t need any more urging, hustling Norah past the Amazon, who yelled out, “Call me,” to Norah, but didn’t come after them.

Not that Norah needed the protection. As soon as they were out of Myra’s eyesight she shoved Trip’s arm off and rounded on him. “Who the hell are you, and what do you think you’re doing?”

“Those things didn’t seem to be such a pressing issue a few minutes ago.”

“I had to play along onstage.”

“And what about your agent? Why didn’t you tell her the truth?”

Norah whipped around and headed off, pulling out her cell phone as she went. “You’re right, I should be honest with her. Maybe she’ll know how to deal with you.”

Trip plucked the phone out of her hand and shut it off. “I don’t need to be dealt with.”

She took her phone back. “Would there be any point in getting a restraining order?”

“What for?” Trip took her phone again, without being obnoxious about it this time, and dropped it into her purse. “You didn’t exactly push me away in there. Nobody will believe you need protection from me.”

“I should file a police report, at the very least.”

“Go ahead, you’ll get laughed out of the station house.”

“Hollie’s show is syndicated, but it’s a late-morning program.”

“Maybe only the stay-at-home moms of Chicago saw your interview this morning, but by this time tonight the rest of America, not to mention parts of Canada and Mexico, will have seen the clip of you and me kissing. Then there’s the verbal catfight between you and Hollie. And before you tell me nobody cares, you should remember why your agent booked you on this show. You’re a pretty big deal right now.”

“The kind of ‘big deal’ an unscrupulous man like you would try to capitalize on. So why don’t you tell me what you’re after?”

“Do you really think I’m a threat?”

“I don’t know, but it’s wrong to perpetrate this kind of . . . fraud . . .”

Trip stopped walking when she did, both of them staring through the glass doors that led to the parking lot, except they couldn’t see the parking lot because of the reporters and cameramen crowded around the exit, not in Paris Hilton numbers, but enough to be daunting.

“Well,” Trip said as they were spotted and the handful of reporters crowded closer to the door, “if you want to set the record straight, here’s your chance.”

NORAH TUGGED ON THE BOTTOM OF HER
jacket, squared her shoulders, and stepped forward, prepared to call his bluff. Damn her and her straightforward ilk.

He caught her by the arm, tugged her back. “Just hear me out,” Trip said, “then you can send me away if you want to.”

“Fine,” she said, but she took off, out the door, through the crowd on the other side, going as fast as she could in an attempt to ditch Chicago’s anemic form of paparazzi, which turned out to be junior reporters from the
Sun Times
and the
Tribune
with a couple of freelancers thrown in for variety.

And she couldn’t ditch them because she was wearing heels. Not great for speed-walking, but they did amazing things for her legs. Too bad she wore such unflattering clothes. Trip could tell there was a decent package inside the ugly wrapping—not one of those Hollywood stick figures—he liked curves, and she moved with the kind of grace that told him she knew how to operate the equipment. Her face was good, too, pretty rather than beautiful, and full of character.

But it was the mind that worried him. Norah MacArthur was neither stupid nor naïve. She was a woman who held her emotions in a firm grip and controlled her expression enough that he found it a challenge to read her. She didn’t make spot decisions either. She thought things through, worked out the pros and cons before she chose a course. In the current situation it worked to his advantage. In the long run it was going to be trouble. There would be times when he needed her to follow blindly without asking questions. Norah wasn’t a woman who would be led. That meant he’d have to gain her trust. With her history that wouldn’t be easy.

Trip stepped between her and the peanut gallery. A couple of steely looks were enough to convince them to drop the pursuit, that and the fact that Norah MacArthur wasn’t exactly cover story material, and definitely not famous enough to get a black eye over.

Norah glanced over her shoulder and saw their audience dispersing. She slowed her pace a bit but kept walking in the opposite direction from Lake Michigan, which, it being the tail end of October, was a good thing. It might be Indian summer, but the temperature hadn’t climbed much over sixty, and the wind coming off the water would be at least fifteen degrees colder than that. Trip wasn’t exactly a cold weather kind of guy. He liked it hot . . . His eyes slid sideways. He jerked them forward again. Norah MacArthur might be hot under the right circumstances, but the rest of her screamed Happily Ever After. Trip didn’t do Happily Ever After. Hell, he didn’t do all that well with the morning after.

“Either talk or go away and leave me alone.”

“She’s curious,” he said, grinning.

“She’s also impatient.”

“I could always go back inside”—he turned to do just that—“Hollie did press me for an interview—”

“Wait.”

“Worried about your credibility?”

“It’s worse than that. I’m worried about what people—women—will think of me for turning down a man like you.”

“A man like me?”

She rolled her eyes. “Don’t be self-deprecating. You know what I mean. If I send you off after the way you kissed me, every woman in the country will question my sanity, not to mention my sexual orientation. Not that my sexual orientation is the point . . .”

They came to the side street between the television station and the parking structure where she’d left her car. Four lanes of sporadic traffic zoomed through the intersection, slowing when the light turned yellow. Norah looked both ways, more by habit than anything else, since the little red hand on the crosswalk sign was holding her hostage at the curb. Then she frowned, her eyes drawn to a car that wasn’t slowing for the yellow light. Then the light turned red and the car kept coming, changing lanes as horns blared and brakes squealed, veering around stopped cars until it was in the right lane, the engine roaring as it sped up. Heading straight for them.

Norah froze, eyes and mouth wide, mind completely empty as the car got bigger and bigger until she couldn’t see anything else, and it began to seep into her brain that she was about to be killed by a complete stranger on a crowded downtown street, for a reason she couldn’t begin to fathom—

Rough hands grabbed her, dragged her back as the car zoomed by, so fast it was a blur, a roar of sound and wind that whipped her skirt up and stole her breath. Or maybe that was because she was up against a stone wall with Trip plastered over her, cradling her head against his shoulder. Unless he’d forgotten to tell her he was born on Krypton, he wasn’t going to be any protection from two tons of metal driven by a homicidal maniac. But he tried anyway, and darn it, why did he have to go and be a hero?

“Oh, my God, are you okay?”

“We’re fine,” Trip said, brushing by the concerned woman and the rest of the bystanders who’d rushed over after the black Lexus bumped back down the curb and took off.

Norah needed a minute; Trip gathered her close, overloading her already strained nerves to the point where she let him wrap his arm around her and hurry her off. They hadn’t gone a block before she shoved him away. “What the hell was that?”

“Attempted murder.”

“It wasn’t a very good attempt.”

“It seemed pretty good from where I was standing. Which was in front of you.”

“Um, thank you?”

“And?”

“And I think it’s time you started talking. You can start with your name—your real name.”

“James Aloysius Jones, III,” he said. “Trip for short.”

She looked at the hand he held out. She didn’t take it. “A little late for that, considering. Besides, knowing your name and knowing you are two different things.”

“Then get to know me.”

She blinked, took a second to process that, and still couldn’t make sense of it. “Why?”

“Because I’m a nice guy?”

“Nice guys don’t kiss complete strangers in front of an audience unless they have an ulterior motive. What’s yours?”

“Well . . . I’m writing a book, and I was thinking you could help me get published.”

Norah stopped walking, let her head fall forward. Trip Jones was handsome and charming and sexy, but she’d grown up with a man like that—at least the handsome and charming part—and having a father who was also a con man meant she could smell a snow job a mile away.

“Really,” Trip said, “all I want is a little help, and I’m gone.”

She started walking again, taking a right at the entrance to the parking structure. “Why don’t you give Myra a call? I’m sure she’d like to hear from you.”

“So you’re too important to help me get my work out there?”

“Your work? Let me tell you about your work.” She took in his jeans and long-sleeve Henley, meeting his eyes before she could get drawn into admiring the long, muscular lines of the body beneath the clothes. “You look all laid-back and relaxed, but your bearing is military.”

He tried to slouch. He didn’t quite pull it off.

“And when you talk to me, you stare me straight in the eyes.”

“Which means I’m telling the truth.”

“That’s what everyone believes, but people who are telling the truth generally hesitate, and their gaze shifts to the right as they search their memory. Liars rehearse, so they look you in the eyes. And there, the muscle in your jaw flexed once, and your eyes narrowed just a little. You’re annoyed, but you suppressed it without even trying.”

“So you have me all figured out.”

“How could I? You’re too practiced at controlling your expression, letting the world see only what you want it to see. That means you’re either a grifter or a cop.”

“You don’t sound too enthused about either possibility.”

“I’m not, but my money is on cop, probably federal considering your military background. And since it seems to matter to you, I consider that the lesser of two evils.”

“I’m FBI.”

She lifted a brow and crossed her arms.

He read her skepticism loud and clear, digging in his back pocket and coming out with a leather bifold wallet. Norah took it and flipped it open. She didn’t have to study it long; she’d seen enough FBI badges to know it was authentic. And she’d been questioned enough times to know what he wanted. “You’re here about Lucius.”

“Which you knew going in, so how accurate can your character assessment be?”

Her first reaction was to let it go. Then she glanced over at him, and decided a point needed to be made, so he didn’t think she was a fool. And so she wouldn’t make a fool of herself over a man who appealed to her far too much for her own good.

“You laugh a lot,” she began, interpreting the lines on his face, “which means you are easygoing. Probably why you didn’t make a career of the military, and why being a federal officer appeals to you. You’re still working within the same set of rules, you feel like you’re contributing, but there’s no set schedule, and that suits you better. It also means you’re not interested in stability, and you don’t do long-term relationships. Your parents are likely divorced or—”

“My parents died in a car accident when I was twelve.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, and she truly was. She understood how it felt to lose parents, even though one of hers was very much alive. “It explains a lot. You were old enough to know what you lost and remember it, young enough for it to mark you permanently. You’re afraid of that kind of loss, so you don’t let anyone close.” And she needed to remember she was talking to a person, not writing a case study. No matter how annoying that person was.

“You don’t pull your punches,” he said.

“You invaded my life, and you expect me to handle you with kid gloves?”

“It would have been nice.”

She gave him a look, but there was a smile at the end of it.

“How much do you know about your father?”

“So we’re being honest now?”

“Only if you answer the question.”

She bumped a shoulder, pulling open the door to the stairway and starting up. “Lucius MacArthur,” she said, trying not to think about him following her up the stairs, his eyes level with her butt. All of her butt. She curbed her embarrassment. He wasn’t interested in her butt. He was interested in her family connections. Nothing new there, except her regret over it. And wasn’t that troublesome?