Kathleen Creighton: Kincaid’s Dangerous Game

And he felt an odd little flutter beneath his breastbone when it occurred to him he wasn’t just watching her because she was someone he needed to keep track of. He was watching her for the sheer pleasure of it.

Okay, so she’s attractive, he thought, squirming in the booth while a spoonful of wonton sat cooling halfway between the bowl and his mouth. So what? Given what he was pretty certain was her genetic makeup, that was no big surprise. So far, all of Cory Pearson’s siblings had been exceptionally attractive people. Why should this one be any different?

And yet, she was different. He couldn’t put his finger on what made her so, but she was. Not beautiful, and certainly not pretty-both of those adjectives seemed both too much and too little to describe her heart-shaped face and neat, compact little body. She wasn’t tall and willowy, like her twin sister Brooke, and while her hair was blond and neither curly nor straight-also like Brooke’s-hers was a couple of shades darker and cut in haphazard layers, and it looked like she might be in the habit of combing it with her fingers. He couldn’t tell about her eyes, of course. But, maybe due to being unable to see past the shades, he’d spent quite a bit of time looking at her mouth. It fascinated him, that mouth. Her lips weren’t particularly full, but exquisitely shaped, with an upward tilt at the corners. And then there were those surprising dimples. Her teeth weren’t perfectly straight, which led him to surmise she’d run away from home before the mandatory teenage orthodontia had taken place. In an odd sort of way, he was glad.

What she was, he decided, was dynamic. There was just something about her that drew his gaze and held it, like a magnet.

“That all you’re having?” She asked it in that breathless way she had as she slipped into the booth opposite him, carrying a plate loaded with an impossible amount of food.

“Just the first course.” He stared pointedly at her heaped plate. “Is that all you’re having?”

“Just the first course.” She contemplated the assortment on her plate, then picked up her fork, stabbed a deep-fried shrimp and dunked it into a plastic cup containing sweet-and-sour sauce. “So, what are you, some kind of cop?” She popped the morsel into her mouth and regarded him steadily while she chewed.

Holt raised his eyebrows. “What makes you think that?”

“Oh, please.” She forked up something with a lot of broccoli and bean sprouts. “You have cop written all over you.”

He didn’t know how to answer that, so he didn’t, except for a little huff of unamused laughter. She was beginning to annoy the hell out of him, with this cat and mouse game she was playing.

He pushed his soup bowl aside, and instantly a very young Chinese girl was there to whisk it away and give him a shy smile in exchange. He watched her quick-step across the room while he pondered whether or not to ask Billie why she was so well acquainted with cops, since in his experience your everyday law-abiding citizen wouldn’t be able to spot a cop unless he was wearing a uniform and a badge. He decided there wasn’t much point in it, since he was pretty sure she’d only tell him what she wanted him to know-either that, or an outright lie.

He excused himself and went to the buffet, where he spent less time deciding on his food selections than on how he was going to handle the next round with Billie Farrell. He was beginning to suspect she might not be an easy person to handle. Maybe even impossible. He’d already concluded that asking her direct questions wasn’t likely to get him anywhere. So maybe he ought to try letting her do the asking. See where that led him.

“So,” he said affably as he slid back into the booth and picked up his fork, “where were we?”

“You were about to tell me you’re a cop,” Billie said, studying what food was left on her plate-which wasn’t much.

“Was.” He gave her an easy smile. “Not anymore. Haven’t been for quite a while.”

“Ah. Which means you’re private. Am I right?” She glanced up at him and hitched one shoulder as she picked up a stick with some kind of meat skewered on it. She nibbled, then added without waiting for his reply, “Otherwise you wouldn’t still have the look.”

“The look…” He muttered that under his breath, then exhaled in exasperation and took one of his business cards out of his jacket pocket and handed it to her.

She glanced at it but didn’t pick it up. “So. Who are you working for?” It seemed casual, the way she said it-but then, he couldn’t see her eyes.

“Nobody you know.” And he could have sworn he saw her relax, subtly. But then, with her, how could he be sure?

He watched her finish off the skewered meat then carefully lick the stick clean of barbecue sauce. Watched the way her lips curved with sensual pleasure, and her little pink tongue slipped tantalizingly between them to lap every possible morsel from the skewer. When he realized hungry juices were pooling at the back of his own throat, he tore his eyes away from her and tackled his own plate.

“So…let me get this straight. You’re a private dick-”

“Investigator.”

“Sorry-investigator, hired by somebody I don’t know, and…What is it, exactly, you want with me?”

Chewing, he pointed with his fork at the card she’d left lying on the table. “If you read that, it says I specialize in finding people.” He paused, took another bite. “I’ve been hired to find someone.” He glanced up at her. “And I believe you might be able to help me.”

“Hmm.” She stared down at her plate while above the dark glasses her forehead puckered in what seemed to be a frown. “Why?”

“Why what? Why do I think you can help me?”

She shook her head. “Why do you-or the people you work for-want to find this person?” The dark lenses lifted and regarded him blankly. He could see twin images of himself reflected in them, which, of course, told him nothing. “There’s all kinds of reasons to want to find somebody, you know.”

“It’s kind of complicated,” Holt said, picking up his napkin and wiping his lips with it. Stalling because he hadn’t decided whether it was time to put his cards on the table-and why was it everything that came into his mind seemed somehow related to poker? “But I can tell you, the people who hired me don’t mean this person any harm.”

“Yeah, well, there’s all kinds of ways to do someone harm.” She cast a quick look over her shoulder at the buffet tables, then abruptly slid out of the booth, leaving her almost-empty plate behind.

Leaving Holt to contemplate her words and complexities while he stared at her plate and a low-intensity hum of excitement vibrated through his chest. He was becoming more and more certain he’d found his client’s last missing sibling, and equally certain she was never going to willingly admit to her true identity, for reasons he couldn’t quite figure out. He was going to have to find another way to positively prove Billie Farrell was, in fact, Brenna Fallon.

The plate she’d left sitting on the table seemed to shimmer and grow in size as he gazed at it. For some reason the girl with the quick hands hadn’t whisked it away yet, evidently being occupied elsewhere in the dining room. Billie was busy, too, heaping a salad-size plate with goodies from the dessert table. Holt threw them both a glance, then plucked the wooden barbecue skewer off of Billie’s plate and wrapped it carefully in a clean paper napkin.

Billie had no idea what she was putting on her plate; the buffet table in front of her was a blur. Her heart was pounding, although she was confident nobody watching her would ever guess it.

Watching me…